1 

OLENDER REPORTING, INC. 

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Washington: 202-898-1108 • Baltimore: 410-752-3376 

Toll Free: 888-445-3376

1 Environmental Protection Agency 

2 

3 

4 Clean Power Plan 

5 Proposed Federal Plan and Model Rules 

6 

7 

8 

9 9:21 a.m. to 8:00 p.m. 

10 Wednesday, November 18, 2015 

11 

12 

13 

14 

15 

16 William Jefferson Clinton East Building 

17 1201 Constitution Avenue, N.W. 

18 Washington, DC 20004 

19 

20 

21 

22 
2 

OLENDER REPORTING, INC. 

1100 Connecticut Avenue NW, #810, Washington, DC 20036 

Washington: 202-898-1108 • Baltimore: 410-752-3376 

Toll Free: 888-445-3376

1 EPA PANEL: 

2 MORNING SESSION: 

3 REID HARVEY, Panel Chair, Director of Clean Air 

4 Markets Division 

5 TONI JONES 

6 MATT CLOUSE 

7 

8 AFTERNOON SESSION: 

9 SARAH DUNHAM 

10 JULIA MILLER 

11 ELYSE STEINER 

12 

13 EVENING SESSION: 

14 KEVIN CULLIGAN 

15 DAN SCHRAMM 

16 JESSICA GORDON 

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OLENDER REPORTING, INC. 

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1 M O R N I N G S E S S I O N 

2 C O N T E N T S 

3 PAGE 

4 INTRODUCTION - REID HARVEY 11 

5 

6 PUBLIC COMMENTS 

7 SANDY LINDSEY, National People's Action & 19 

8 Counties United for Action 

9 MARY METZMEIER, Communities for Action, 24 

10 Affiliate of National People's Action 

11 BILLIE KIRKTON, Illinois People's Action, 27 

12 Bloomington, IL 

13 BECCA SUMMERS, Advocacy Coordinator, Virginia 32 

14 League of Conservation Voters 

15 AMINAH ZAGHAB, Environment America 35 

16 KIMBERLY TURNER, Director of Government 41 

17 Affairs for Allergy and Asthma Network 

18 DIANE BOULIS, Ohio Valley Environmental 46 

19 Coalition (OVEC) 

20 DELEGATE ALFONSO LOPEZ, Chair of the Virginia 50 

21 Environment and Rural Energy Caucus 

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1 C O N T E N T S (Cont'd.) 

2 PAGE 

3 VENU GHANTA, Director, Federal Environmental 55 

4 and Energy Policy, Duke Energy 

5 CECILIA CALVO, Environmental Justice Program, 62 

6 Department of Justice, Peace, and Human 

7 Development at the U.S. Conference of 

8 Catholic Bishops 

9 PAUL BILLINGS, Senior Vice-President, Advocacy 67 

10 of the American Lung Association 

11 GARY EWART, American Thoracic Society 73 

12 JANICE NOLEN, Assistant Vice-President for 78 

13 National Policy, American Lung Association 

14 JESSICA ECKDISH, Sierra Club 83 

15 ANNA KASIBHATLA, Student 88 

16 SCOTT BURGER, Sierra Club Volunteer, Richmond, 91 

17 Virginia 

18 IVY MAIN, Her own behalf (energy policy 96 

19 analyst) 

20 LINDSEY MENDELSON, Global Warming Solutions 102 

21 Fellow, Environmental America 

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1 C O N T E N T S (Cont'd.) 

2 PAGE 

3 JACQUELINE LOWE, Sierra Club Volunteer, 107 

4 Chesapeake, Virginia 

5 JOELLE NOVEY, Interfaith Power and Light 111 

6 KENDYL CRAWFORD, Her own behalf 116 

7 PETER JOHNSON, Executive Director, Green 118 

8 and Gray 

9 NISHA WITT, Aesop Technologies 123 

10 ZOE BERKERY, Manager of Federal Policy, 128 

11 Business Council for Sustainable Energy 

12 ERNIE REED, Virginia Organizing, Friends of 136 

13 Nelson, and Wild Virginia 

14 LINDA BURCHFIEL 142 

15 DAN MISLEH, Executive Director, Catholic 147 

16 Climate Covenant 

17 ELIZABETH PERERA, Climate Policy Director, 152 

18 Sierra Club 

19 CHAD OBA, Chair, Friends of Buckingham 157 

20 NICOLE HOLSTEIN, National Wildlife Federation 162 

21 

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1 A F T E R N O O N S E S S I O N 

2 C O N T E N T S (Cont'd.) 

3 PAGE 

4 INTRODUCTION - SARAH DUNHAM 168 

5 

6 PUBLIC COMMENTS 

7 JOE COOK, Chair, Chesapeake Bay Group, 176 

8 Sierra Club 

9 VERNON SAVAGE, Sierra Club 181 

10 FRANCES CRUTCHFIELD, Sierra Club Volunteer 182 

11 HERBERT FITZELL, His own behalf 183 

12 JOHN LUKER, His own behalf 185 

13 MARJORIE LEACH-PARKER, Her own behalf 187 

14 JONATHAN BEAN, His own behalf 191 

15 TOM BURKETT, Co-Director of Virginia River 195 

16 Healers 

17 TODD NEDWICK, Housing & Energy Efficiency 202 

18 Policy Director, National Housing Trust 

19 AMANDA HUROWITZ, Mother and teacher 208 

20 SARA CHIEFFO, Mother and Vice-President 213 

21 of Government Affairs, League of 

22 Conservative Voters 
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OLENDER REPORTING, INC. 

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1 C O N T E N T S (Cont'd.) 

2 PAGE 

3 ANN VALDEZ, Community Voices Heard and 218 

4 Member of National People's Action 

5 KATE ADDLESON, for Richard H. Ball, Ph.D., 222 

6 Retired Energy Policy & Technology Analyst 

7 REV. PAUL WILSON, Union Hill and Union Road 228 

8 Baptist Churches, Buckingham County, VA 

9 EMILY BECKER, National Wildlife Federation 233 

10 ELI BRIGGS, Senior Government Affairs 236 

11 Director, National Association of County 

12 and City Health Officials 

13 WILLIAM PENNIMAN, Sierra Club, Virginia 240 

14 Chapter 

15 DONNEL BAIRD, CEO of Block Power 244 

16 FRANK KNAPP, Co-Chair American Sustainable 247 

17 Business Council and President, CEO, and 

18 Co-Founder, South Carolina Small Business 

19 Chamber of Commerce 

20 SAMANTHA LOCKHART, Comments from the Policy 253 

21 Team, National Wildlife Federation 

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8 

OLENDER REPORTING, INC. 

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1 C O N T E N T S (Cont'd.) 

2 PAGE 

3 LINDSEY MOSELEY ALEXANDER, on Behalf of 258 

4 Dr. Vijay Subramaniam 

5 LAURA KATE BENDER, on Behalf of Dr. Erica 262 

6 Holloman 

7 KATIE HUFFLING, Director of Nurses for 267 

8 Healthy Environments 

9 CHARLOTTE WALLACE, Nurse and Intern with 272 

10 Nurses for Health Environments 

11 EARL MITCHELL, Volunteer, Sierra Club 277 

12 MARY ANNE HITT, Director, Beyond Coal, 282 

13 Sierra Club 

14 JIM DOYLE, President, Business Forward 288 

15 DR. PAUL KAPLOWITZ, Virginia Sierra Club 294 

16 SUSAN BONNEY, Great Falls Group, Sierra 299 

17 Club 

18 FELIPE FLORESCA, Emerald Cities 304 

19 Collaborative 

20 GAVIN GROSSMAN, Environment America 316 

21 EMMA FRIEND, Legislative Office, Sierra Club 321 

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9 

OLENDER REPORTING, INC. 

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1 C O N T E N T S (Cont'd.) 

2 PAGE 

3 JOHN NOVACK, Head of Environmental Issues 327 

4 Team, National Rural Electric Cooperative 

5 Association 

6 JUANITA CONSTIBLE, Her own behalf 334 

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9 

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15 

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OLENDER REPORTING, INC. 

1100 Connecticut Avenue NW, #810, Washington, DC 20036 

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1 E V E N I N G S E S S I O N 

2 C O N T E N T S 

3 

4 PAGE 

5 INTRODUCTION - Kevin Culligan 337 

6 

7 PUBLIC COMMENTS 

8 NATALIE PIEN, Her own behalf 344 

9 ROBERT BINGAMAN, National Organizing 350 

10 Director, Sierra Club 

11 EMMANUEL NEWMAN, Legal Intern, We Act for 354 

12 Environmental Justice 

13 ARTHUR BARKMAN, Washington, D.C. Sierra Club 362 

14 SHANTHA READY ALONSO, Executive Director, 366 

15 Creation Justice Ministries 

16 JACQUELINE GALLANT, Her own behalf 377 

17 MAX BROAD, Washington, D.C. Sierra Club 382 

18 STEPHANIE HERRON, Her own behalf 387 

19 DAVID HULL, Sierra Club 391 

20 ELENA WOODS, Her own behalf 397 

21 JOHN FISHER, His own behalf 402 

22 COLLIN REES 406 
11 

OLENDER REPORTING, INC. 

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1 P R O C E E D I N G S 

2 M O R N I N G S E S S I O N 

3 MR. HARVEY: Good morning. Can you-all 

4 hear me okay? Good. 

5 My name is Reid Harvey. I'm the Chair of 

6 the Public Hearing today. Thank you for coming. 

7 Joining me on the panel are Toni Jones 

8 and Matt Clouse. And I have a -- a statement to 

9 make. I'll have some logistical instructions for 

10 participants as well. 

11 Fossil fuel fired power plants are the 

12 largest source of U.S. carbon dioxide emissions 

13 or carbon pollution, accounting for 31 percent of 

14 U.S. total greenhouse gas emissions. 

15 Reducing carbon pollution from power 

16 plants is an essential step in lessening the 

17 impacts of climate change and providing a more 

18 certain future for our environment, our health, 

19 and future generations. 

20 We are here today to listen to your 

21 comments on the EPA's Proposed Federal Plan and 

22 Model Rule to implement the Clean Power Plan for 
12 

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1 existing power plants. 

2 On October 23rd of 2015 the EPA published 

3 in the Federal Register its Proposed Federal Plan 

4 to Implement Emission Guidelines for Power Plants 

5 under Section 111(d) of the Clean Air Act. The 

6 EPA's 111(d) rule, known as the Clean Power Plan, 

7 takes effect on December 22nd, 2015, and applies 

8 to affected power plants that began construction 

9 on or before January 8th of 2014. 

10 The Federal Plan and Model Trading Rules 

11 demonstrate a readily available path forward for 

12 Clean Power implementation and present flexible, 

13 affordable implementation options for states. 

14 The Model Rules provide a cost effective pathway 

15 to adopt a trading system supported by EPA and 

16 makes it easy for states and power plants to use 

17 emissions trading. It does the heavy lifting for 

18 states who may choose to use a Model Rule as 

19 their state plan. The EPA would implement the 

20 Federal Plan in any state that does not submit an 

21 approvable plan. 

22 This proposal includes four discreet 
13 

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1 proposed actions: A rate-based federal plan for 

2 each state with affected electric generating 

3 units; a mass-based federal plan for each state 

4 with affected electric generating units; a rate5 based model trading rule for potential use by any 

6 state; and a mass-based model trading rule for 

7 potential use by any state. 

8 The Proposed Federal Plans will achieve 

9 the same levels of emissions performance as 

10 required of state plans under the Clean Power 

11 Plan. Federal plans will be finalized only for 

12 those states with affected EGUs that the EPA 

13 determines have failed to submit an approvable 

14 111(d) State Plan by the relevant deadlines set 

15 in the Emission Guidelines. 

16 In those states where a federal plan may 

17 be required, a final federal plan will implement 

18 the same emission guidelines for affected power 

19 plants outlined in the Clean Power Plan. It 

20 would not require additional control requirements 

21 or impose additional costs. 

22 Even where a federal plan is put in place 
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1 for a particular state, that state will still be 

2 able to submit a plan which, if approved, will 

3 allow the state and its sources to exit a federal 

4 plan. States may take delegation of 

5 administrative aspects of the federal plan in 

6 order to become the primary implementers or 

7 submit partial state plans in order to take over 

8 the implementation of a portion of a federal 

9 plan. 

10 States operating under a federal plan may 

11 adopt complementary measures outside of that plan 

12 to facilitate compliance and lower costs to the 

13 benefit of power generators and consumers. 

14 The proposal also includes a Model Rule 

15 for those states that are developing their own 

16 state plans. The EPA intends to finalize both 

17 the rate-based and mass-based model trading rules 

18 in the summer of 2016. A state program that 

19 adheres to the model trading rule provisions 

20 specified in this rulemaking, when final, would 

21 be presumptively approvable. 

22 There are standalone portions of the 
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1 model trading rule such as the evaluation, 

2 measurement, and verification procedures for 

3 emission rate credits that would be approvable 

4 even if a state adopted an approach that differs 

5 in other respects from the Model Rule. 

6 In addition, the proposal contains a 

7 finding that it is necessary or appropriate to 

8 implement a Section 111(d) federal plan for the 

9 affected EGUs located in Indian Country. CO2 

10 emission performance rates for these facilities 

11 were finalized in the Clean Power Plan. 

12 Information on how the EPA will reach out 

13 to communities is also included in the proposal, 

14 and information on how EPA will reach out 

15 throughout the comment period to communities, and 

16 an overview of the action that the EPA is taking 

17 to ensure that vulnerable communities are not 

18 being disproportionately impacted by this 

19 rulemaking. 

20 So I'm going to close on some logistics. 

21 If you would like more details on the proposed 

22 rule, there are fact sheets available at the 
16 

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1 registration desk outside. 

2 I'd like to go through a couple 

3 housekeeping items and ground rules that will 

4 make today's hearing run smoothly. 

5 First, be sure you've checked in at the 

6 registration desk even if you are not planning to 

7 speak today. And if you signed up to speak 

8 online or by phone but haven't told us that 

9 you're here, please step out to the registration 

10 desk and let the EPA staff know that you have 

11 arrived. 

12 So I will call up speakers in pairs. 

13 When your name is called, please come to the 

14 speakers' table at the front of the room. When I 

15 call on you to speak, please state your name and 

16 spell it for the court reporter. Your comments 

17 will be transcribed and included in the record of 

18 comments on the proposed rule. If you have an 

19 extra copy of your statement, please provide it 

20 to the court reporter as well. 

21 Each speaker will have five minutes to 

22 give comments. We have a timer light to help you 
17 

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1 know how much time you have left to speak. When 

2 the light turns from green to yellow, that means 

3 you have one minute remaining. When it turns 

4 red, that's a signal that you're at five minutes, 

5 and it's time to stop. When you're finished 

6 speaking, please remain at the table until the 

7 person next to you has also completed his or her 

8 testimony. 

9 And we're here to listen to you today, 

10 but we may ask questions to clarify your 

11 comments. So I'll proceed calling up pairs of 

12 speakers as we have them. And again, if you 

13 brought a written copy of your testimony, please 

14 share it with the court reporter, and also, 

15 please share it at the registration table outside 

16 before you leave 

17 We'll put any written comments that are 

18 submitted today in the official docket for the 

19 proposed rule. We will also have comment cards 

20 available at the registration desk if you'd like 

21 to submit additional written comments today. 

22 If you want to comment in writing later, 
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1 stop by the materials table near the registration 

2 desk and pick up a copy of the instructions for 

3 submitting written comments. Comments must be 

4 received by January 21st of 2016. 

5 So let me assure you that EPA gives as 

6 much consideration to comments that we receive in 

7 writing as we do to comments we receive at public 

8 hearings like this one. So if you have more 

9 comments you would like to provide the EPA, 

10 please submit them by the comment period 

11 deadline, and your comments will be reviewed. 

12 If you have any questions during the day, 

13 please see the staff at the registration desk, 

14 and someone will assist you. 

15 So, thank you again for taking the time 

16 today to share your comments on the EPA's 

17 proposal. And let's get started. 

18 Our first two speakers will be Sandy 

19 Lindsey and Mary Metzmeier. Please come forward. 

20 Just let me know when you're ready, and 

21 we can turn on the light. Who -- who would like 

22 to speak first? 
19 

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1 MS. LINDSEY: I'll go. 

2 MR. HARVEY: What is your name, please? 

3 MS. LINDSEY: My name is Sandy Lindsey. 

4 MR. HARVEY: Could you move the mike a 

5 little closer to you so we can hear you? 

6 MS. LINDSEY: Is that better? 

7 MR. HARVEY: Yes. So, Ms. Lindsey, when 

8 you're ready, let me know, and I'll turn on the 

9 timer. 

10 MS. LINDSEY: I'm ready. 

11 MR. HARVEY: Okay. 

12 MS. LINDSEY: My name is Sandy Lindsey. 

13 Sandy is S-A-N-D-Y; Lindsey, L-I-N-D-S-E-Y. 

14 And I’m a leader with National People's 

15 Action and Communities United for Action in 

16 Cincinnati, Ohio. And we've taken time off work 

17 today and brought my kids here -- 

18 MR. HARVEY: Could you move the mike a 

19 little closer? I'm having -- still having a hard 

20 -- 

21 MS. LINDSEY: Yeah. 

22 MR. HARVEY: -- hearing you. Or speak a 
20 

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1 little louder. 

2 MS. LINDSEY: Here? 

3 MR. HARVEY: Yeah. 

4 MS. LINDSEY: Okay. And basically, we 

5 came here from Cincinnati, Ohio, and out of 

6 school and out of work today because this is very 

7 important to us. 

8 Today I'm asking that you imagine 

9 yourself holding your lifeless six-week-old baby 

10 girl in your arms. She's gasping for air, and 

11 you're watching her helplessly. You don't know 

12 what to do and you just watch because you're 

13 hopeless and helpless. 

14 You rush her to the hospital where they 

15 hook her up to all types of tubes and machines, 

16 and then you find out that she has asthma and 

17 then that she may have to deal with this for the 

18 rest of her life. Why does this have to happen 

19 to her? Does this innocent child deserve to go 

20 through this? 

21 So, she gets a little older and the 

22 doctors end up sending her home with a breathing 
21 

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1 machine because the hospital visits are too 

2 frequent. She sees her sisters and her friends 

3 outside playing, and instead of her being out 

4 there playing with the kids, she is asking 

5 herself why am I in trouble because she's on her 

6 third breathing treatment for the day. This is 

7 her everyday life. What did she do to deserve 

8 this? 

9 This is my daughter Deasia Miracle, and 

10 this is how she has lived the last -- past nine 

11 years of her life. 

12 Going through this with her asthma led me 

13 to do a little research on my own, and I found 

14 out that a lot of our health issues are side 

15 effects from where we live. We live in a lower16 income predominantly black neighborhood. And 

17 actually, our neighborhood is one of the top 10 

18 Cincinnati neighborhoods where people only live 

19 to be 71 years of age at the max. That's 20 

20 years shorter than in wealthy, predominantly 

21 white neighborhoods. 

22 In my neighborhood there's coal fire -- 
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1 coal fire power plants that are pumping out 

2 hazardous chemicals. There are semi trucks 

3 running up and down the street all hours of the 

4 day, and it's literally killing us off. Who's to 

5 say we should die 20 years younger just because 

6 of where we live and what we can't afford? We 

7 all should get a chance to live a full and 

8 healthy life. I deserve it. My kids deserve it. 

9 So do you and so do yours. 

10 I know that even in the Bible it says 

11 that faith without works is dead. I have faith 

12 that this will work out, but I'm asking you all 

13 to put action behind it. We need a plan that is 

14 monitored and that will give my daughter her 20 

15 years back. 

16 It's time to put people of this country 

17 first. Companies are thriving while families are 

18 continuously suffering. We need to end this 

19 cycle. Unhealthy people cannot work, and my 

20 child's life is more important than a bottom 

21 line. 

22 I live in Ohio which will probably end up 
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1 using the Federal Implementation Plan. There are 

2 four things I'm asking you to do to make it as 

3 strong as possible: Number one, polluters should 

4 pay to support renewable energy and 

5 weatherization in low income communities. Number 

6 two, we need affordable renewable energy for low 

7 income people and people of color. Number three, 

8 we don't need fracking, natural gas, or nuclear 

9 energy to cause other environmental problems. 

10 And, Number four, we want our communities to 

11 control the energy projects. We want to make 

12 sure that FIP creates good quality green jobs in 

13 our neighborhoods. 

14 And I'm not the only person who feels 

15 that way. I created an on-line petition and 

16 collected over 20,000 signatures. And I'd like 

17 to present them to you for a part of the record. 

18 Today is my little miracle's ninth 

19 birthday. At six weeks, while holding her 

20 lifeless body, I didn't think we would make it 

21 this far. But for her birthday I'm asking that 

22 you grant her the ultimate give, and that's life. 
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1 Give my baby and many others like us our 20 years 

2 back. We need a Clean Power Plan that holds 

3 polluters accountable. Let's work together to 

4 take care of the people and planet that we were 

5 blessed with. Thank you. 

6 MR. HARVEY: Thank you for your 

7 statement, and thank you for coming from Ohio. 

8 We'll see if we have clarifying questions, but we 

9 want to also wish you a happy birthday today. 

10 MS. LINDSEY: Thank you. 

11 MR. HARVEY: Any questions or -- no. 

12 Okay. Thank you very much. 

13 Our next speaker will be Mary Metzmeier. 

14 Let me know when you're ready. 

15 MS. METZMEIER: Okay. Is that good? 

16 My name's Mary Metzmeier, M-A-R-Y, 

17 M-E-T-Z-M-E-I-E-R. And I came, also, from 

18 Cincinnati, Ohio, with Sandy, and Deasia, and 

19 Destiny over there. And I work with Communities 

20 for Action. We're an affiliate of National 

21 People's Action. And I moved to Cincinnati 28 

22 years ago from rural Kentucky. 
25 

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1 When I moved to Cincinnati, I discovered 

2 this phenomenon. Growing up I didn't know many 

3 people who had asthma. In my career -- in my 28-

4 year career in low income communities I don't -- 

5 can't remember a family who doesn't have asthma. 

6 There's this joke in Cincinnati about do 

7 you have allergies. Well, you haven't lived in 

8 Cincinnati long enough. That's not a joke. In 

9 the Ohio River valley where all this air hangs 

10 out and the pollution from coal power plants and 

11 from factories just creates this cumulative 

12 effect, and it -- as Sandy said -- is killing us. 

13 On Saturday we're going to bury one of 

14 our neighborhood leaders. She is somebody who --

15 you would not believe this woman. She fought 

16 litter with a roll of masking tape because if you 

17 littered on her street, she would hunt you down 

18 and put that litter back on your car. There was 

19 no prostitution on her street because she would 

20 chase them off. She was a treasure in this 

21 community, and she died of complications of 

22 respiratory illnesses and cancer. And that has 
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1 to do with where she lived. 

2 So today I'm asking you to really and 

3 truly -- not just on paper but put an actual plan 

4 together that is going to reward true, clean, 

5 renewable power, not fossil fuels, not fracking, 

6 not natural gas; but what we need is actual 

7 renewable energy. We want the set asides to not 

8 be 5 percent. We want them to be 50 percent. 

9 And we want low income communities to have 

10 dedicated allowances for those set asides. 

11 We want to be able to control the 

12 renewable energy in our communities because there 

13 is no way that these people who have made us sick 

14 and killed us over these years should be in 

15 control of selling the -- the wind and the sun 

16 back to us. We want to be able to use the limits 

17 that you guys, I hope, will set on fossil fuel 

18 energy production to spur creativity and job 

19 production that we know will happen; but we need 

20 your support to do that. 

21 We also want to have more weatherization 

22 for low income communities because we know that 
27 

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1 people like Ms. Cary had to crank up her air 

2 conditioning all the time in the -- in the 

3 weather because she could not breathe without it. 

4 She needed better weatherization on her house so 

5 she could reduce her energy bill. And so, those 

6 are the things that we hope you will put -- and 

7 make the Clean Power Plan and the FIP as strong 

8 as possible so that our low income communities 

9 can breathe, can live, and can have sustainable 

10 green jobs. Thank you very much. 

11 MR. HARVEY: Thank you. And again, thank 

12 you both for coming from Cincinnati to join us. 

13 Do we have questions? 

14 MR. CLOUSE: I don't think so. 

15 MR. HARVEY: Okay. Thank you. 

16 Our next two speakers, if you'll come 

17 forward, are Billie Kirkton and Becca Summers. 

18 When you're ready, we'll start with 

19 Billie Kirkton. 

20 MR. KIRKTON: All right. That's 

21 B-I-L-L-I-E, K-I-R-K-T-O-N. So, my name is 

22 Billie Kirkton, and I'm a leader with Illinois 
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1 People's Action from Bloomington, Illinois. And 

2 I've traveled here today to voice my support for 

3 the Clean Power Plan and to call on you to 

4 strengthen the Federal Implementation Plan. 

5 Today more than ever the future of our 

6 society and our planet depends on the decisions 

7 we make together. As a young person, I feel the 

8 weight of bad decisions that have been made 

9 before me and the responsibility to help ensure 

10 that we transition from dirty sources of energy 

11 to a sustainable future. No less than the fate 

12 of humanity rests upon speeding up this 

13 transition. 

14 Like others here, we at Illinois People's 

15 Action and National People's Action -- also 

16 represented here today -- believe that more can 

17 and should be done to limit carbon emissions. 

18 The Clean Power Plan gives us an opportunity to 

19 not only do that but to take a massive step 

20 forward in transforming our current energy 

21 infrastructure, combating climate change, 

22 creating jobs, and bringing environmental justice 
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1 to those communities that have been and always 

2 will be affected the most by extractive sources 

3 of energy. 

4 We urge the EPA to reject false solutions 

5 such as natural gas, nuclear, and biomass, as we 

6 cannot simply replace one problem for another. 

7 In Illinois we have seen natural gas touted and 

8 marketed as the American-made affordable, cleaner 

9 source of energy. But hydraulic fracking has 

10 been shown time and time again to devastate the 

11 environment, releasing mass amounts of greenhouse 

12 gases when extracted from the earth, causing 

13 earthquakes, and producing adverse health effects 

14 for communities near drill sites. 

15 In addition, about half our energy in 

16 Illinois currently comes from nuclear power. I 

17 live 40 miles from a power plant in Clinton, 

18 Illinois, where state workers are given potassium 

19 iodine tablets to take in case of emergency. 

20 Now that the nuclear industry is seeing 

21 an inevitable transition coming, they are 

22 fighting hard to be considered renewable energy 
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1 and are demanding that Illinois taxpayers 

2 continue to subsidize their industry to the tune 

3 of hundreds of millions of dollars. 

4 Instead of relying on these dangerous and 

5 destructive forms of energy that profit from 

6 exploiting people and the earth, we can shift to 

7 create a real market for wind and solar 

8 industries while investing in real and meaningful 

9 energy efficiency measures. 

10 Finally, this plan gives federal and 

11 state governments a chance to make the emerging 

12 clean energy economy not only more sustainable 

13 but also more equitable. This is vital as a 

14 shifting energy market may well perpetuate 

15 existing inequities further rather than 

16 alleviating them without government intervention. 

17 To that end the Clean Energy Incentive 

18 Program is a crucial part of the Clean Power 

19 Plan. By encouraging early investment in 

20 renewable energy and energy efficiency in low 

21 income communities, we can turn the tide toward 

22 equity in the environment and the economy. 
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1 Low income communities bear the burden of 

2 the dirty energy economy we have now. Power 

3 plants and dirty factories are disproportionate 

4 -- disproportionately located in or near such 

5 communities. After decades of under investment 

6 and pollution, low income communities need deep 

7 investment to begin to recover. 

8 To truly see the Clean Power Plan live up 

9 to its potential, participation in the Clean 

10 Energy Incentive Program should be mandatory for 

11 all states. And the program should be 

12 significantly expanded. Without participating, 

13 the CEIP -- in the CEIP by every state low income 

14 communities and communities of color will 

15 continue to bear the unfair burden of toxic air 

16 and criminal underinvestment. We've got to put 

17 people and planet over profits, and that means 

18 universal participation in this essential 

19 program. 

20 These renewable energy and efficiency 

21 projects in low income communities have the power 

22 to transform and revitalize those communities; 
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1 but this kind of project takes time to get off 

2 the ground. And so, lastly, we hope that the 

3 time window for projects to qualify for the CEIP 

4 and receive allowances will be expanded to help 

5 more communities take advantage of this fantastic 

6 program. Thank you. 

7 MR. HARVEY: Thank you, Mr. Kirkton. 

8 Any questions? 

9 (No audible response.) 

10 MR. HARVEY: Okay. Becca Summer. Let me 

11 know when you're ready. 

12 MS. SUMMERS: I'm Becca Summers. It's 

13 B-E-C-C-A, S-U-M-M-E-R-S. 

14 Good morning. My name's Becca Summers, 

15 and I'm here representing the Virginia League of 

16 Conservation Voters as their Advocacy 

17 Coordinator. We have an active membership base 

18 of 6,500 individuals throughout the State of 

19 Virginia, and our organization regularly reaches 

20 out to nearly 20,000 Virginians. 

21 Our members are concerned and involved 

22 conservationalists [sic], a part of the 
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1 conservation voter movement who understand the 

2 role our elected representatives play in passing 

3 -- the passing of strong, pro environmental bills 

4 and regulations. 

5 I am here to urge the EPA, as a federal 

6 organization and a leader for our nation, to put 

7 in place both a strong federal implementation 

8 plan and Model Rules. 

9 While Virginia LCV hopes state leaders 

10 will sit down with stakeholders and develop their 

11 own unique state plan, which makes most sense for 

12 their residents and state economy, it is clear 

13 that some localities will not be doing this. 

14 When this happens, for the sake of their health 

15 and the well being of future generations, 

16 American citizens rely on the EPA enforcing a 

17 strong federal implementation plan with each 

18 delinquent state. If the EPA continues with 

19 their plan to develop a single plan, the Virginia 

20 League of Conservation Voters encourages a mass21 based plan to go into effect. 

22 A mass-based plan is simpler to design 
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1 and implement, readily incorporates trading 

2 opportunities, and automatically benefits from 

3 private investments and energy efficiency and 

4 renewable energy. As proposed, this plan is a 

5 good backstop for states that are unwilling to 

6 protect public health from carbon pollution by 

7 meeting the reduction targets in the Clean Power 

8 Plan. 

9 Not only will this federal plan guaranty 

10 reducing carbon pollution and protecting public 

11 health, but it will also serve as a resource 

12 states can use in developing their own plans. 

13 Finally, we would like to encourage the 

14 EPA to continue their efforts to reach out to 

15 vulnerable communities and make sure that those 

16 are disproportionately impacted by carbon 

17 emissions have a voice at the table during the 

18 development of the federal -- final federal plan. 

19 Thank you for your time, and we look forward to 

20 reviewing the finalized plan. 

21 MR. HARVEY: Thank you, MS. Summers. 

22 MS. JONES: Thank you for your 
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1 presentation. One question or maybe a point of 

2 clarification here. I did note the support for 

3 the mass-based plan, but are there any other 

4 aspects that you would like to call to attention 

5 for strengthening the federal plan? 

6 And if you don't have those today, I just 

7 wanted to make a point to note that when 

8 submitting written comments, it would be helpful 

9 to have any other aspects of the plan very 

10 detailed specifics outlined in those comments for 

11 the agency to consider. 

12 MS. SUMMERS: Okay. I can definitely 

13 submit that with the written comments online. 

14 MS. JONES: Okay. Thank you. 

15 MR. HARVEY: Thank you both. 

16 Our next pair of speakers -- our next 

17 pair of speakers -- and I may not pronounce your 

18 name correctly -- Aminah Zaghab and Kimberly 

19 Turner. 

20 Ms. Zaghab, would you like to begin 

21 first? I'm sure I got it wrong, but tell me. 

22 MS. ZAGHAB: It's all right. I'm a 
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1 little used to it. My name's Aminah Zaghab, 

2 A-M-I-N-A-H, last name Z-A-G-H-A-B. 

3 First, I want to thank the EPA and the 

4 Obama Administration, and the President for 

5 moving forward with the Clean Power Plan. 

6 Limiting global warming pollution from power 

7 plants, the single largest source of such 

8 pollution in the U.S. is the critical step 

9 forward to protecting our health and our 

10 environment and the worst impacts of global 

11 warming. 

12 On behalf of Environment America I 

13 appreciate this opportunity to provide feedback 

14 on the Draft Model Rule for States and the Draft 

15 Federal Implementation Plan. 

16 Every day it's becoming clearer that 

17 global warming is happening right now, and it's 

18 already hitting close to home. From drought and 

19 fires on the west coast to flooding and 

20 hurricanes on the east we're feeling this in our 

21 local communities and across the country. And 

22 the signs that we need to act urgently are 
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1 accelerating. That's why it's so imperative that 

2 we implement the Clean Power Plan as quickly as 

3 possible and accelerate our transition to clean 

4 energy. 

5 We know that global warming is largely 

6 caused by carbon pollution, and we should be 

7 doing everything in our power to invest in energy 

8 sources that do not contribute to this pollution 

9 and contribute to global warming. 

10 And the U.S. has the ability to do this 

11 with wind, solar, and energy efficiency. America 

12 has the potential to power itself 10 times over 

13 from the wind that blows both over the land mass 

14 and also off of the east coast. Colorado is 

15 already producing more than 10 percent of its 

16 electricity from wind farms. And wind power 

17 already generates more than a quarter of the 

18 power used in Iowa. 

19 And the U.S. has further potential to 

20 produce more than a hundred times its electricity 

21 from solar installations as the nation consumes 

22 each year. Every single state has the potential 
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1 to generate more than the electricity needed from 

2 the sun. 

3 Across the nation last year a home or 

4 business installed a solar installation every two 

5 and a half minutes. And according to the latest 

6 solar job census from the Solar Foundation, the 

7 solar industry employed more than 173,000 

8 individuals last year and remains among the most 

9 rapidly growing sectors of our economy. 

10 Colorado alone has enough solar potential 

11 to power the entire state 362 times over. 

12 Virginia could produce nearly 20 times as much 

13 power as it consumes through solar energy. 

14 In addition, we also have our cheapest 

15 and quickest tool to prevent global warming 

16 pollution -- energy efficiency. Energy 

17 efficiency offers vast, untapped potential to get 

18 more done simply by using less electricity. The 

19 American Council for Energy Efficient Economy 

20 estimates that we could reduce overall usage of 

21 energy across our economy 40 to 60 percent by the 

22 year 2050 even as our economy continues to grow 
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1 by deploying better technology in our buildings, 

2 in our industries, in our homes. 

3 Investing in efficiency programs on mass 

4 scale would create more than a million jobs and 

5 boost our economy to the order of hundreds of 

6 millions of dollars per year. 

7 All this goes to say we have clean energy 

8 solutions. And in order to address the climate 

9 crisis, we need to accelerate our progress 

10 towards 100 percent clean energy. As the EPA 

11 finalizes the Model Rule and the Federal 

12 Implementation Plan, we strongly encourage you to 

13 ensure that these programs encourage investment 

14 in these clean energy resources as much as 

15 possible. 

16 I have a few specific recommendations on 

17 the Proposed Rule and the Federal Plan. The 

18 faster the EPA can finalize this rule, the more 

19 certainty states will have, as they develop their 

20 compliance plans, and the quicker that states can 

21 move forward. 

22 We urge the EPA to consider whether some 
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1 components can be finalized shortly after the 

2 comment period closes to accelerate this 

3 transition. 

4 Further, the EPA should apply the Federal 

5 Plan provisions swiftly should a state decline to 

6 adequately carry out its responsibilities. We 

7 support the EPA's proposal to issue a federal 

8 plan for any state that does not meet one of the 

9 interim state planning milestones. And we urge 

10 the EPA to do so within less than one year after 

11 finding that the state is not on track to submit 

12 a final state plan. 

13 And lastly, the EPA must ensure that 

14 affected power plants abide by the enforceable 

15 limits on their emissions of global warming 

16 pollution. There must be effective 

17 accountability mechanisms for this plan to work. 

18 Thank you again for the opportunity to 

19 speak. And I appreciate the EPA's efforts in 

20 moving forward with this proposal, and I urge you 

21 to move forward in swiftly cleaning up our 

22 nation's power plants and transitioning us to 
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1 clean energy. 

2 MR. HARVEY: Thank you very much. 

3 Questions? No? Okay. Thank you. 

4 Kimberly Turner. 

5 MS. TURNER: Hello, my name is Kimberly 

6 Turner, K-I-M-B-E-R-L-Y, Turner, T-U-R-N-E-R, the 

7 Director of Government Affairs for Allergy and 

8 Asthma Network, a nonprofit organization here in 

9 Vienna, Virginia. 

10 The Allergy and Asthma Network is the 

11 leading nonprofit patient education and advocacy 

12 organization for people living with allergy, 

13 asthma, and related conditions. Our patient 

14 center network unites individuals, families, 

15 health care professionals, industry, and 

16 government decision makers to improve health and 

17 quality of life for Americans living with allergy 

18 and asthma. 

19 I am here today to testify on behalf of 

20 those we serve in support of a strong Clean Power 

21 Plan federal model that would address climate 

22 change and reduce air pollution to protect the 
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1 lives of millions of Americans with allergy and 

2 asthma. 

3 We want to ensure that we will see the 

4 maximum health benefits of the proposed Clean 

5 Power Plan, the prevention of 3,600 premature 

6 deaths, 90,000 asthma attacks, and 300,000 missed 

7 days of work and school each year by 2030 when 

8 the Clean Power Plan will be fully implemented. 

9 For example, Martha Coda, one of our 

10 members, awoken one morning to find her infant 

11 son, Jose, gasping for air from a lack of oxygen. 

12 Terrified, she rushed him to the local hospital 

13 in Long Beach, California, where doctors 

14 stabilized the toddler and sent him home with a 

15 litany of inhalers and asthma medication so he 

16 could catch his breath. However, this cycle went 

17 on for more than five years. She discovered that 

18 many other women and children in her community 

19 were having trouble with respiratory illnesses. 

20 She, like many moms, did not let this rest. She 

21 wanted to find out what was the reason. She was 

22 determined. 
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1 She lived downwind from the nation's 

2 largest port, a complex was making so many people 

3 sick, the industrial corridor filled with exhaust 

4 from diesel powered freight trains, cargo ships, 

5 and traffic that stretches from the ports of Los 

6 Angeles and Long Beach to Riverside, a city of 

7 300,000 residents. 

8 Martha connected with a team of 

9 physicians at the Children's Environmental Health 

10 Center at the University of Southern California. 

11 After a 10-year study they found, one, that lung 

12 development of children who lived near the 

13 corridor was stunted 20 percent smaller than 

14 average; and, two, that the children living 

15 within a quarter mile of a freeway had an 89 

16 percent higher risk of asthma than kids just one 

17 mile away. 

18 Coda hardly needed a study to tell her 

19 this. She and her two other children later 

20 developed severe allergies and asthma, and now 

21 use an arsenal of medications just to get through 

22 the day. 
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1 There are 26 million Americans living 

2 with asthma, 56 billion in annual direct and 

3 indirect costs due to asthma. In order to 

4 protect Martha and her family and the millions of 

5 those whose health is impacted by air pollutions, 

6 states must develop effective plans to meet the 

7 requirements set out by EPA in the Clean Power 

8 Plan. 

9 Should a state fail to comply, EPA must 

10 be prepared to ensure meaningful reductions are 

11 achieved by taking action at the federal level. 

12 The Model Plan -- Power Plan -- should promote 

13 the Clean Energy Incentive Program's components 

14 that focuses on energy efficiency improvements in 

15 low income communities. And the federal plan 

16 should focus on aiding those communities that are 

17 disproportionately impacted by air pollution. 

18 Many residents in low income communities 

19 in Virginia and nationwide could benefit from 

20 having repairs done to their homes that can cut 

21 their energy bills. Our communities will also 

22 benefit from additional jobs that would be 
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1 created to fix these homes. 

2 Beyond energy efficiency efforts EPA can 

3 do more to guaranty that low income communities 

4 do not continue to bear the burden of pollution 

5 under the Clean Power Plan. This includes 

6 excluding biomass incineration as a means of 

7 energy production in the federal or model plans 

8 unless the state of the art pollution controls 

9 are implemented. 

10 More often than not low income 

11 communities carry the burden of biomass 

12 incineration and are exposed to dangerous levels 

13 of particle pollution which is associated with 

14 premature death, heart attacks, and symptoms of 

15 chronic lung disease. Thank you for your time. 

16 MR. HARVEY: Thank you very much. 

17 I was wondering if you could just expand 

18 briefly on your membership, how large is it, and 

19 who are the typical sort of members in your 

20 organization? 

21 MS. TURNER: Certainly. Again, we are -- 

22 we are in Vienna, Virginia. We have 
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1 approximately 500,000 plus members. We are 

2 associated with the ACAAI, which is Allergist of 

3 the Doctor -- the College of Allergy and Allergy 

4 Doctors. We have publications that range -- two 

5 million publications quarterly per year, so we're 

6 quite a large organization. 

7 MR. HARVEY: Thank you very much. Other 

8 questions? Okay. Thank you both. 

9 Our next pair of speakers are Diane 

10 Boulis and Venu Ghanta. Please come forward. 

11 I don't see Mr. Ghanta here. Okay. I 

12 think we have another speaker who would like to 

13 go now, Delegate Alfonso Lopez. Are you here? 

14 So, Ms. Boulis, would you mind starting? 

15 And if you could start by spelling your name? 

16 MS. BOULIS: Diane Boulis, D-I-A-N-E, 

17 B-O-U-L-I-S. 

18 Good morning. I have come in from 

19 Charleston, West Virginia, where I live in a 

20 small holler. As you can tell by my voice, I 

21 have moved to West Virginia. I am not a native. 

22 I am an impacted citizen of mountaintop removal, 
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1 and I have learned so much in the last three 

2 years it frightens me. 

3 I'm here today sponsored by OVEC, the 

4 Ohio Valley Environmental Coalition. And I thank 

5 you for this opportunity to tell you about living 

6 in West Virginia. 

7 I also come here in support of the plan. 

8 And as you well know, West Virginia politicians 

9 are bound and determined not to cooperate with 

10 you. Our newspapers are filled with dire 

11 warnings of loss of coal jobs and blah-dee-blah12 dee-blah [phonetic], the same old thing. Now 

13 that's because the coal barons are in charge of 

14 West Virginia. They've paid for every politician 

15 we have in office. 

16 Currently, 95 percent of West Virginia's 

17 power comes from coal fired plants. And they are 

18 saying there's absolutely no way they can meet 

19 any of your guidelines. 

20 Well, I read your guidelines. For West 

21 Virginia they're the lowest requirements in your 

22 plan. You've already made all kinds of 
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1 compromises for West Virginia. And West Virginia 

2 says, uh-uh, we just ain't gonna play. 

3 Well, as a citizen of West Virginia, I'm 

4 begging you to intervene. If our politicians are 

5 that blind sighted and that backward thinking, 

6 please don't assume that all of its citizens are 

7 the same. 

8 Now I will say the economy there is just 

9 as tied to coal which is silly because our 

10 largest employer is Walmart. 

11 So, in the plan there must be some way to 

12 replace the jobs lost. Our communities have 

13 already been hit so hard by the downturn in the 

14 market. There is no war on coal. Let me say 

15 that again. There is no war on coal. But there 

16 is a serious downturn in the market. And for a 

17 state that relies completely on coal for its 

18 economy, we are in dire straits. So that part of 

19 the plan is very, very important to us. 

20 Currently everyone's saying, okay, fine. 

21 Let's go to natural gas. Well, fracking isn't 

22 any better. We all see the news reports, the 
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1 earthquakes, the tainted water, the oh, golly, 

2 we're not going to tell you what chemicals we're 

3 using when we frack. We jumped into fracking 

4 without a whole lot of scientific preplanning. 

5 We're going to wind up paying for that. 

6 West Virginia already pays and pays 

7 heavily for our use of coal as a nation. I don't 

8 want natural gas to be the next thing that ruins 

9 us. We have a beautiful natural state. In some 

10 our hollers we don't get a whole lot of sunshine, 

11 but there have to be alternatives. And if some 

12 of these states can produce 20 percent more than 

13 what they need in solar, well, you know what? 

14 Coal has been running this nation electrically 

15 with its coal for a very long time, and maybe 

16 it's time that on the federal level somebody 

17 starts taking care of West Virginia. 

18 I thank you very much for your time 

19 today. I don't have any additional statistics 

20 for you. I'm pretty much just a caregiver. 

21 MR. HARVEY: Thank you, Ms. Boulis. 

22 MS. BOULIS: Thank you. 
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1 MR. HARVEY: Okay. Thank you. Delegate 

2 Alfonso Lopez. 

3 DELEGATE LOPEZ: Hello. Thank you for 

4 being here today and sitting through all the 

5 testimony. 

6 MR. HARVEY: Closer. 

7 DELEGATE LOPEZ: Yes. As a member of the 

8 Virginia House of Delegates and Chair of the 

9 Virginia Environment and Rural Energy Caucus of 

10 the General Assembly, I'm here today to share my 

11 strong support for EPA's Clean Power Plan. The 

12 Commonwealth of Virginia is at a crossroads. 

13 Whether it's the economic repercussions of sea 

14 level rise on Virginia's coastline, the health 

15 consequences of breathing polluted air or the 

16 threat of more extreme weather conditions, 

17 climate changes have an impact today on the day18 to-day lives of citizens of the Commonwealth. 

19 Thankfully, EPA's Clean Power Plan 

20 creates an opportunity for the Commonwealth to 

21 reduce its carbon pollution, mitigate the 

22 consequences of climate change, and grow our 
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1 economy through investments in clean energy and 

2 energy efficiency. By adapting a mass based 

3 approach, Virginia would not only need to reduce 

4 CO2 mass by 1.7 percent from 2012 levels, 

5 compared to an average of 20 percent Virginia has 

6 one of the most -- compared to an average of 20 

7 percent Virginia has one of the most achievable 

8 mass based targets for the entire country. 

9 If we comply using a market based 

10 multistate plan, Virginia could both lower energy 

11 prices and leverage our lower -- low carbon and 

12 competitive advantage to raise additional revenue 

13 by selling pollution credits to higher polluting 

14 states in our region unlike West Virginia. 

15 Fortunately, Virginia is already well on 

16 its way to achieving and even exceeding 

17 compliance under the mass based target. In fact, 

18 our existing plans fossil fuel generation changes 

19 achieve 65 percent of the pollution reductions 

20 required to reach our mass based target. In 

21 addition, Virginia is already working to cut 

22 emissions by increasing renewable energy 
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1 generation and improving energy efficiency 

2 throughout the Commonwealth. 

3 We have a stated goal of generating 15 

4 percent of our electricity for renewable energy 

5 by 2025. Virginia is also currently working to 

6 boost energy efficiency across the Commonwealth 

7 with -- with a goal of cutting energy waste by 10 

8 percent by 2022 relative to 2006 levels. 

9 If we achieve these goals along with the 

10 existing planned fossil fuel changes, Virginia 

11 will dramatically exceed its reduction goals 

12 which allows the Commonwealth to sell pollution 

13 credits under mass to other states and generate 

14 revenue that we can use to promote additional 

15 clean energy and energy efficiency. 

16 The Clean Power Plan gives Virginia the 

17 flexibility and autonomy to continue our success 

18 and craft a Virginia specific plan to meet our 

19 specific goals. While we have taken some 

20 important first steps to shrink carbon emissions 

21 in Virginia, adopting a mass -- a mass based 

22 approach will let us build on this momentum and 
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1 make great strides in reducing carbon pollution. 

2 In addition to helping avoid the negative 

3 consequences of climate change, bringing down 

4 carbon emissions will -- will create new clean 

5 energy jobs and grow our economy. 

6 Neighboring states have already installed 

7 solar capacity at rates 10 to a hundred times 

8 higher than Virginia. This untapped solar 

9 capacity means that there is tremendous 

10 opportunity in Virginia to develop a robust solar 

11 energy market that will create new jobs 

12 throughout the Commonwealth. 

13 Virginia's offshore wind resources are 

14 also abundant and unused. The build-out of our 

15 offshore wind lease area -- the first such lease 

16 in the mid Atlantic -- could provide as many as 

17 10,000 clean energy jobs and power 700,000 homes 

18 with pollution-free energy. 

19 Additionally, energy efficiency programs 

20 are the most cost effective way for utility 

21 companies to meet growing demand for electricity. 

22 These programs can also strengthen our economy by 
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1 creating local jobs that cannot be outsourced. 

2 Moreover, according to NRDC's modeling, by 2020 

3 alone limits on carbon pollution could create 

4 more than 5,600 new jobs in Virginia and 

5 contribute 517 million in energy savings for 

6 Virginia households. 

7 The solution is clear. The Clean Power 

8 Plan will create an opportunity for the 

9 Commonwealth of Virginia to address the impacts 

10 of climate change while growing our economy, 

11 creating a more sustainable energy future and 

12 preserving our environment for future 

13 generations. 

14 I look forward to working with the EPA, 

15 Governor McAuliffe, and the entire Virginia 

16 General Assembly as this process moves forward to 

17 develop the best possible plan for Virginia's 

18 environment, economy, and energy future. Thank 

19 you. 

20 MR. HARVEY: Thank you, Delegate Lopez 

21 for joining us today. We appreciate your 

22 testimony. 
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1 DELEGATE LOPEZ: Sure. 

2 MR. HARVEY: Are there questions? Okay. 

3 Thank you. 

4 DELEGATE LOPEZ: Do I spell my name or 

5 anything? 

6 MR. HARVEY: Yes, I think we're good. 

7 DELEGATE LOPEZ: Okay. 

8 MR. HARVEY: Our next pair of speakers 

9 are Venu Ghanta and Cecilia Calvo. 

10 We'll start with Mr. Ghanta. When you're 

11 ready, just say so and I'll start the clock. 

12 MR. GHANTA: Good morning. My name is 

13 Venu Ghanta, and I'm a Director of Federal 

14 Environmental and Energy Policy for Duke Energy. 

15 Thank you for the opportunity to speak 

16 here today to share some of our initial views on 

17 the EPA's Proposed Federal Plan and Model Rules 

18 for the Clean Power Plan. We will be submitting 

19 detailed comments prior to the close of the 

20 comment period. 

21 Duke Energy is a national leader in 

22 reducing emissions and providing our customers 
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1 with increasing clean electric power. We have 

2 diversified our generating fleet and reduced 

3 carbon dioxide emissions approximately 20 percent 

4 since 2005 while keeping power reliable and 

5 affordable to the 23 million people who rely on 

6 us. Duke Energy will continue to invest in 

7 energy technologies that are good for our 

8 customers, our communities, and the environment. 

9 Duke Energy supports utilizing market 

10 based approaches to reducing emissions. 

11 Emissions trading has been used successfully for 

12 years to achieve emission reductions that lower 

13 costs than traditional command and control 

14 approaches while also insuring the environmental 

15 integrity of the programs. 

16 As states are currently evaluating 

17 options for implementing the Clean Power Plan, we 

18 believe EPA should finalize both the proposed 

19 rate-based and mass-based model trading rules as 

20 expeditiously as possible. If the EPA decides to 

21 finalize only one form of federal plan, we would 

22 encourage the EPA to finalize a mass-based plan, 
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1 particular since states and utilities have 

2 extensive experience implementing mass-based 

3 training programs. 

4 Duke Energy supports many of the specific 

5 elements underpinning the trading programs in the 

6 EPA's proposal, including allowing a state 

7 subject to a federal plan to submit a partial 

8 state plan to replace the federal allowance 

9 allocations with its own allowance allocations; a 

10 limited banking of allowances and emission rate 

11 credits or ERCs within and between the interim 

12 and final compliance periods with no expiration 

13 of banked allowances or ERCs; allowing interstate 

14 trading between affected units in states covered 

15 by federal plans and affected units in states 

16 covered by comparable state plans; and evaluating 

17 compliance after every multiyear compliance 

18 period without implementing intervening allowance 

19 holding requirements as in the RGGI and CARP 

20 programs. 

21 However, I want to highlight the specific 

22 provision of the proposal that we are concerned 
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1 about. The EPA has proposed that if an affected 

2 unit does not operate for two consecutive 

3 calendar years, the unit only receives 

4 allocations for a limited number of years 

5 thereafter before those allocations go to the 

6 renewable energy are already set aside for the 

7 state in which their retired unit is located. 

8 This may have the unintended consequence of 

9 encouraging non-economic coal generation to 

10 remain in service in order to maintain its 

11 allowance allocation. This situation is 

12 exacerbated for units that the EPA included in 

13 the 2012 baseline and to which are proposed as to 

14 outdate allowances but that have already retired 

15 or will retire prior to 2019. These units would 

16 not receive any allocation at all under the EPA's 

17 proposal, nor would their allocation go to other 

18 affected units. Instead, those allowances would 

19 go to the already set aside. 

20 In North Carolina where Duke Energy has 

21 retired 17 coal-fired units, accounting for 2,259 

22 megawatts of generation since the beginning of 
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1 2012, around 10 percent of the state's 2022 

2 allowances would be transferred to the already 

3 set aside just from unit retirements alone. When 

4 combined with the proposed set aside level of 5 

5 percent, that would amount to a total of 15 

6 percent set aside for RE by 2022 in North 

7 Carolina before accounting for any other unit 

8 retirements that have not yet been planned or 

9 announced. 

10 The EPA should recognize that allocating 

11 allowances to utilities won't show that the 

12 emission standards are achieved in the most cost 

13 effective way possible which will minimize rate 

14 impacts for our customers. We will be submitting 

15 detailed written comments addressing this 

16 concern. 

17 Finally, we appreciate the EPA's attempts 

18 to incentivize states and utilities to take early 

19 action via the creation of the Clean Energy 

20 Incentive Program or CEIP. However, we would 

21 suggest that the CEIP not be a set aside but 

22 rather should consist entirely of additional 
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1 allowances or ERCs. This would not significantly 

2 change the stringency of the Clean Power Plan but 

3 would be helpful in insuring liquidity and 

4 mitigating price spikes in the early years of 

5 compliance. 

6 Thank you again for the opportunity to 

7 share Duke Energy's views on this proposal. 

8 MR. HARVEY: Thank you very much. Just a 

9 clarification on your last comment: So your -- 

10 your suggestion is that states not set aside a 

11 portion of their interim period budget to have 

12 the federal match; is that correct of what you're 

13 saying? 

14 MR. GHANTA: I -- that's correct, that we 

15 would not want those allowances to be taken from 

16 the 2022 to '24 pool that they would be 

17 additional. So there's already the federal match 

18 that's above and beyond the federal pool -- 

19 MR. HARVEY: Okay. 

20 MR. GHANTA: -- 300 million. And then we 

21 would say another 300 million should be -- 

22 MR. HARVEY: Okay. 
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1 MR. GHANTA: -- additional. 

2 MR. HARVEY: Okay. And with respect to 

3 the retirement point that you made -- 

4 MR. GHANTA: Uh-huh. 

5 MR. HARVEY: -- are you proposing an 

6 alternative? I heard a concern, but I didn't 

7 hear an alternative approach, and I was -- 

8 MR. GHANTA: Yes. 

9 MR. HARVEY: -- curious if you had one. 

10 MR. GHANTA: And -- and we are aware that 

11 in the proposal EPA teed up some other 

12 alternative options and then taking comment on a 

13 few other additional, we'll be sharing that in 

14 our written comments -- 

15 MR. HARVEY: Right. Okay. 

16 MR. GHANTA: -- in more detail. 

17 MR. HARVEY: Great. Super. 

18 MR. GHANTA: Thanks. 

19 MR. HARVEY: Okay. 

20 MR. CLOUSE: I'd just like him to -- have 

21 him spell his name for the court reporter. 

22 MR. GHANTA: Oh, sure. First name is 
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1 Venu, V-E-N-U; last name is Ghanta, G-H-A-N-T-A. 

2 MR. HARVEY: Thank you very much. 

3 Okay. Cecelia Calvo. 

4 MS. CALVO: Good morning. 

5 MR. HARVEY: Good morning. 

6 MS. CALVO: My name is Cecelia Calvo. I 

7 oversee the Environmental Justice Program within 

8 the Department of Justice, Peace, and Human 

9 Development at the United States Conference of 

10 Catholic Bishops. 

11 On behalf of Archbishop Thomas Wenski and 

12 Bishop Cantu, Chairman of the Domestic Justice 

13 and Human Development and International Justice 

14 and Peace Committees of the United States 

15 Conference of Catholic Bishops, I thank you for 

16 this important and timely hearing on an issue 

17 that clearly affects God's creation and the 

18 entire human family. 

19 In his encyclical on ecology in Laudato 

20 Si, Pope Francis calls on all people to care for 

21 God's creation and our common home for the well 

22 being of current and future generations. He 
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1 wrote this encyclical to enter into dialog with 

2 all people about our common home. 

3 As Pope Francis said in his encyclical, 

4 we need a conversation which includes everyone 

5 since the environmental challenge we are 

6 undergoing and its human roots concern and affect 

7 us all. As Pope Francis said during his visit to 

8 our nation, now is the time for courageous 

9 actions and strategies aimed at implementing a 

10 culture of care and an integrated approach to 

11 combating poverty, restoring dignity to the 

12 excluded, and at the same time protecting nature. 

13 He continued, climate change is a problem 

14 which can no longer be left to a future 

15 generation. When it comes to the care for our 

16 common home, we are living at a critical moment 

17 of history. 

18 The U.S. Bishops stand united with Pope 

19 Francis in his call to protect creation. The 

20 Bishops speak as people of faith, not as 

21 technical experts. They are Pastors offering a 

22 moral perspective rooted in a rich faith 
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1 tradition. 

2 On August 3rd, the day the EPA announced 

3 its Final Rule Limiting Carbon Pollution, 

4 Archbishop Wenski said, a new national standard 

5 to reduce carbon pollution from existing power 

6 plants is an important step forward to protect 

7 the health of all people, especially children, 

8 the elderly, and poor and vulnerable communities 

9 from harmful pollution and the impacts of climate 

10 change. 

11 Power plants are the largest stationary 

12 source of carbon emissions in the United States 

13 and a major contributor to climate change; and we 

14 know the effects of climate change are borne by 

15 the most vulnerable people both here and around 

16 the world. 

17 These standards are a vital step to 

18 protecting the world's most vulnerable people and 

19 allow the United States to exercise critical 

20 leadership necessary for reaching a global 

21 agreement at the upcoming negotiations on climate 

22 change in Paris. 
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1 As the U.S. Bishops wrote in their 

2 statement, global climate change, a plea for 

3 dialog, prudence, and the common good, action to 

4 mitigate global climate change must be built upon 

5 a foundation of social and economic justice. 

6 Our committee chairmen support a national 

7 standard to reduce carbon pollution and recognize 

8 the important flexibility given to states in 

9 determining how best to meet these goals. The 

10 EPA's Proposed Federal Plan can serve as a model 

11 for states as they take steps to develop their 

12 own plans. States and local leaders know best 

13 how to design customized plans that will reduce 

14 carbon pollution in the most cost effective way, 

15 help states move toward the development of clean 

16 energy and protect poor and vulnerable people. 

17 States have the ability to implement these 

18 standards in a comprehensive manner and to adopt 

19 complementary measures needed to protect poor and 

20 vulnerable people. 

21 As the EPA and states take steps to 

22 implement the final standards, the Bishops urge 
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1 them to be guided by moral principles articulated 

2 in their July 30th, 2014, letter to the EPA, 

3 including respect for human life and dignity, all 

4 efforts to reduce the impact of climate change 

5 should recognize human life and dignity as the 

6 foundation for a healthy society. 

7 Social and economic justice -- any 

8 additional cost that such standards may generate 

9 must be distributed fairly. Workers should be 

10 protected from negative effects that might arise 

11 and should receive assistance to mitigate impacts 

12 on their livelihoods and families. 

13 Participation -- communities should have 

14 a voice in shaping these standards based on their 

15 local impact, especially low income communities 

16 whose voice is often not heard. 

17 Archbishop Wenski and Bishop Cantu 

18 appreciate the Agency's commitment to address 

19 this urgent global challenge confronting the 

20 human family and call upon leaders in government 

21 and industry to act responsibly, justly, and 

22 rapidly to implement these standards. 
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1 The moral measure of debate and decisions 

2 on climate change will be whether our nation acts 

3 with prudence to safeguard God's creation, 

4 advance the common good, and protect humanity. 

5 Thank you. 

6 MR. HARVEY: Thank you. Are there 

7 questions? Okay. Thank you both. 

8 MR. CLOUSE: Did she spell her name? 

9 MR. HARVEY: I'm sorry? 

10 MR. CLOUSE: I'm not sure she spelled her 

11 name. 

12 MR. HARVEY: Yes, sorry. Could you spell 

13 your name for the reporter again? 

14 MS. : Sure. Cecilia, C-E-C-I-L-I-A, 

15 Calvo, C-A-L-V as in Victor-O. 

16 MR. HARVEY: Thank you. 

17 Our next two speakers are Paul Billings 

18 and Gary Ewart. 

19 And why don't we begin with Mr. Billings. 

20 Again, thanks to Matt's reminders. Please start 

21 by spelling your name for the reporter. 

22 MR. BILLINGS: Sure. Good morning, I'm 
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1 pleased to offer my comments today supporting the 

2 Clean Power Model Rules and Federal Plan. 

3 My name is Paul Billings, P-A-U-L, 

4 B-I-L-L-I-N-G-S. I'm a Senior Vice-President for 

5 Advocacy of the American Lung Association. The 

6 American Lung Association is the nation's oldest 

7 voluntary health organization. Our mission is to 

8 save lives by improving lung health and 

9 preventing lung disease. 

10 Today is World COPD Day. It's a day when 

11 we raise awareness about Chronic Obstructive 

12 Pulmonary Disease. COPD is the term we use to 

13 describe emphysema and chronic bronchitis. For 

14 everyone, but especially people with chronic lung 

15 disease, climate change is a major public health 

16 threat. Communities across the country are 

17 already experiencing its impacts, including more 

18 dangerous ozone and particle pollution in the air 

19 they breathe. 

20 The Clean Power Plan is a major step 

21 forward to protect public health from the impacts 

22 of climate change. The American Lung Association 
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1 was proud to support the Clean Power Plan and is 

2 now working in states across the country to 

3 ensure the rule is implemented in a way that 

4 maximizes the benefits to human health. 

5 Protecting health means not only reducing 

6 the carbon pollution that causes climate change 

7 but also ensuring the EPA's projections for the 

8 health benefits that will come from reducing 

9 other dangerous air pollutants alongside carbon 

10 are achieved. These benefits include preventing 

11 up to 3,600 premature deaths, preventing 90,000 

12 asthma attacks, and avoiding 300,000 days missed 

13 from work and school each year starting in 2030. 

14 As I've testified before, clean healthy 

15 air is personal for me and my family. My wife 

16 and are blessed to have two active daughters. 

17 Our youngest runs track. She's a sprinter, but 

18 she also has asthma; and hot smoggy days make it 

19 harder for her to breathe. Smog induced asthma 

20 can be more than the difference between winning 

21 and losing the race. It can be much more serious 

22 for her, leading to wheezing and struggling for 
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1 breath. 

2 In my wife's fifth grade class in 

3 Wheaton, Maryland, there are far too many 

4 children with asthma who are at risk from air 

5 pollution. Their families, my family, and 

6 millions of others with asthma, COPD, and other 

7 chronic conditions need states to write and 

8 implement strong plans to reduce carbon emissions 

9 and reduce the other dangerous pollutants at the 

10 same time. 

11 It is critical that EPA finalize a strong 

12 federal plan as a backstop for any states that do 

13 not comply with the Clean Power Plan as well as a 

14 strong Model Rule to provide guidance to the 

15 states that will comply. 

16 The American Lung Association will submit 

17 detailed comments to the docket, so I'll focus my 

18 remarks on two aspects of the Model Rule and 

19 Federal Plan. The importance of preventing 

20 leakage and ensuring that states switch to 

21 cleaner alternative energy sources that best 

22 protect lung health. 
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1 We support EPA's commitment to ensure 

2 that reductions in carbon emissions are real and 

3 not just apparent. We were glad to see that EPA 

4 recognized that some of the actions could result 

5 in leakage or additional emissions that would 

6 come as a side effect in the plans. We support 

7 EPA providing the strongest possible tools for 

8 states to use in the Model Plan and the Federal 

9 Plan to prevent an additional carbon emissions. 

10 We are concerned about the aspects of the 

11 plan that would encourage states to use sources 

12 of energy that have harmful health impacts. In 

13 the Model Rules for rate-based plans EPA would 

14 allow states to take credit for using biomass and 

15 waste energy as alternatives to coal and natural 

16 gas. 

17 The American Lung Association opposes 

18 burning biomass or waste to provide electricity 

19 because of the harmful -- the emissions of 

20 harmful air pollutants that they produce, 

21 including particulate matter and possible air 

22 toxics from waste products. The Clean Power Plan 
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1 should not encourage states to transition from 

2 one -- from burning one harmful source like coal 

3 to burning another harmful one like waste 

4 products. 

5 We are pleased that the Federal Plan 

6 would not allow these fuel options and encourage 

7 EPA to strengthen the Model Rule to eliminate 

8 them as well. 

9 We are pleased under the Clean Energy 

10 Incentive Program EPA will provide incentives to 

11 states to adopt the earliest -- or adopt early 

12 the cleanest alternative sources -- wind and 

13 solar. Both are fully capable of adding great 

14 capacity to our energy supply while not adding 

15 additional harmful pollution to the air we 

16 breathe. 

17 On behalf of the millions of Americans 

18 with chronic lung disease on World COPD Day, we 

19 appreciate the opportunity to provide these 

20 comments on EPA's Model Rule and Federal Plan. 

21 We call on you to finalize strong plans that will 

22 drive the shift to cleaner energy sources that 
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1 will best protect health from harmful air 

2 pollution. Thank you very much. 

3 MR. HARVEY: Thank you, Mr. Billings. 

4 We'll move on to our next speaker, Gary 

5 Ewart. You can start by spelling your name. 

6 MR. EWART: Thank you very much. I am 

7 Gary Ewart, G-A-R-Y, E-W-A-R-t; and I'm with the 

8 American Thoracic Society. 

9 The American Thoracic Society is a 

10 medical professional organization of about 15,000 

11 physicians, researchers, nurses, respiratory 

12 therapists, and other allied health professionals 

13 who care about lung disease. So when you hear 

14 people talk about COPD or asthma, we are the 

15 physicians who do a lot of the treatment of 

16 patients with severe respiratory illnesses. 

17 I'm pleased to offer our comments today 

18 and pleased that the administration is moving 

19 forward with the Clean Power Plan. This is an 

20 essential rule that will have important public 

21 health benefits for today and for generations to 

22 come. 
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1 It should be obvious to most folks, but 

2 it bears repeating that the evidence on climate 

3 change is unequivocable [sic]. We believe that 

4 the science base from several lines of inquiry 

5 makes it clear that the human contributions to 

6 our environment is changing our globe and our 

7 environment in ways that are unsustainable, and 

8 immediate action is required. And we're very 

9 supportive of EPA's steps on this. 

10 But it's not just the science base. We 

11 recently did a survey of U.S. members of the 

12 American Thoracic Society asking them their 

13 comments and views on climate change. Eighty14 nine percent of respondents felt that climate 

15 change was happening; 68 percent judge that 

16 climate change is being driven entirely or mostly 

17 by human activity. That number goes up even 

18 higher when it's a 50-50 split between human 

19 activity and nature. Sixty-five percent believe 

20 that climate change is directly relevant to 

21 patient care. And the free text responses show 

22 that physicians in the United States today are 
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1 already seeing what they believe to be the health 

2 effects of climate change in the patients they're 

3 treating today. 

4 The ATS has also published a workshop 

5 that summarizes what we believe some of the 

6 likely respiratory health effects of climate 

7 change are, including longer growing seasons 

8 leading to more intense and longer allergy 

9 seasons, higher average temperatures leading to 

10 the creation of more ozone which will reduce air 

11 quality as well as higher energy demands from 

12 summer heat waves which will likely lead to more 

13 particulate matter. Summer heat waves are also 

14 going to result in higher heat wave deaths as 

15 we've seen in communities across the country in 

16 summertimes [sic]. We also believe that climate 

17 change is going to increase the spread of vector 

18 borne diseases. 

19 So let me transition to some thoughts 

20 that the American Thoracic Society would like to 

21 offer as states begin their state planning for 

22 meeting the Clean Power Plan implementation 
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1 process. 

2 First of all, co-benefits. We as a 

3 society are very bad about making decisions that 

4 are painful today for future benefit. 

5 Fortunately, this is one of those decisions that 

6 does not have only future benefit because as my 

7 colleague, Mr. Billings, mentioned today, the 

8 steps that we will take to reduce carbon 

9 emissions will also have co-benefits in reducing 

10 other emissions such as ozone, particulate 

11 matter, and other hazardous pollutants. We will 

12 see immediate benefits in reductions of those 

13 emissions which will lead to immediate 

14 improvements in health and lung function, and 

15 reduced asthmas visits, and reduced 

16 hospitalizations and death. 

17 The evidence is pretty clear that ozone 

18 particulate matter and other hazardous air 

19 pollutants have a direct impact on our health 

20 today. As we reduce carbon emissions from our 

21 power plants, we're going to see co-benefit 

22 reductions in ozone, particulate matter, and 
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1 other hazardous pollutants. And as EPA and the 

2 states go through the planning process, we should 

3 keep that in mind. 

4 Second, I would encourage all states as 

5 they do their planning and implementation process 

6 to actively involve the physician and scientific 

7 community. The ATS and our sister organizations 

8 have a wealth of information that we think can be 

9 helpful as states engage in the planning process. 

10 We'd encourage states to actively reach out to 

11 the physician community. 

12 We also would encourage states to beware 

13 the lure of biomass fuels. While each energy 

14 source has its own strengths and weaknesses, 

15 we're -- the ATS is particularly concerned that 

16 many states are not aware of the full health risk 

17 portfolio of biomass fuels. Particularly burning 

18 biomass fuels has the likelihood of increasing 

19 particulate matter emissions as well as ozone and 

20 other hazardous air pollutants. So we would 

21 encourage states to become fully informed on the 

22 risks of biomass fuel before embracing that as a 
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1 viable option as an alternative energy source. 

2 And last, we would encourage EPA to do 

3 everything in its power to encourage states to 

4 move forward and to not delay the process because 

5 delaying the process is going to be harmful today 

6 for people who are exposed to the air pollution 

7 that is being emitted from sources today. So we 

8 would urge EPA to hold states accountable and 

9 move forward swiftly with development 

10 implementation of Clean Power Plans. Thank you 

11 very much. 

12 MR. HARVEY: Thank you. Questions? 

13 Thank you both. 

14 Our next pair of speakers Janice Nolen 

15 and Jessica Eckdish. We'll begin with Ms. Nolen. 

16 If you would start by spelling your name, please. 

17 MS. NOLEN: Sure. Good morning. Thank 

18 you. 

19 My name is Janice, J-A-N-I-C-E, Nolen. 

20 That's N as in Nancy-O-L-E-N. 

21 I'm Assistant Vice-President for National 

22 Policy for the American Lung Association. 
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1 I appreciate this opportunity to share 

2 our perspective on some aspects of the Proposed 

3 Federal Plan and Model Rules under the Clean 

4 Power Plan. As noted earlier, I will submit our 

5 complete comments into the docket. 

6 The American Lung Association represents 

7 millions of Americans with life-changing lung 

8 diseases. Just to name a few, we speak up for 

9 the more than 7 million children with asthma, and 

10 more than 11 million adults with Chronic 

11 Obstructive Pulmonary Disease. 

12 Recent years have showcased the risks 

13 that Americans, but especially people with lung 

14 disease, face from climate change. For example, 

15 this year the heat and drought fostered smoke 

16 from wildfire blazes. As the Washington Post 

17 noted, during the week of July 8th more than 700 

18 fires in Alaska and Canada were blowing smoke 

19 that created unhealthy air pollution levels in 

20 Minneapolis and Colorado. Smoke from wildfires 

21 triggers asthma attacks and increases the risk 

22 that a person with COPD will need emergency care 
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1 because she cannot breathe. Wildfire smoke can 

2 even shorten life. To battle events like this 

3 and to keep them from increasing, we need to 

4 target emissions that worsen climate change. 

5 Reducing carbon pollution using the 

6 emission standards set in the Clean Power Plan 

7 can help us do that. We anticipate that the 

8 states will be able to use the recommendations in 

9 these plans to reduce carbon emissions even more 

10 than the plan requires. 

11 We support EPA's effort to help the 

12 states develop and adopt effective plans to 

13 reduce their carbon emissions. Having model 

14 plans to use will help the states focus their 

15 time and effort on choosing the steps that work 

16 best for them. 

17 My comments will focus on the proposed 

18 guidance for the Clean Energy Incentive Program. 

19 We strongly support the program as a promising 

20 encouragement to all states to start now to 

21 invest in clean renewable energy sources of wind 

22 and solar. We are pleased that EPA has the full 
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1 program in the Federal Plan; however, in the 

2 Model Plans states can opt out of the broad 

3 opportunity for renewable energy and improved 

4 energy efficiency programs. We recommend that 

5 EPA incorporate the program elements fully in the 

6 Model Rule -- in the Model Plan rather than 

7 leaving this as an option for states to decide 

8 later. 

9 In particular, we strongly support the 

10 Clean Energy Incentive Program's component that 

11 focuses on energy efficiency improvements in low 

12 income communities. Many residents in low income 

13 communities could benefit from having repairs 

14 done to their homes that can cut their energy 

15 bills and make their homes warmer. Communities 

16 will also benefit from the additional jobs that 

17 would be created to fix those homes. 

18 However, these communities remain at risk 

19 unless EPA acts to strengthen the proposals. 

20 While the energy efficiency incentives are 

21 welcome, EPA needs to do more in the model rule 

22 and the FIP to ensure that low income communities 
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1 don't continue to bear the outsized burden of 

2 pollution under this plan. 

3 Low income communities have suffered the 

4 problems from pollution from our nation's coal 

5 fired power plants for far too long. They've 

6 lived near these plants where they breathe the 

7 worst of the pollution, including toxic emissions 

8 like arsenic, lead, and carcinogens like benzene 

9 spewed uncontrolled for far too long. They are 

10 suffering more from changes that climate change 

11 brings since research documents that air 

12 pollution harms poorer people more than those 

13 with higher incomes, in part, because they are 

14 more likely to have diseases like asthma that 

15 puts them at greater risk. 

16 We remain concerned that some states will 

17 adopt a plan that does not recognize the 

18 disproportionate -- the continued 

19 disproportionate burden and fails to reduce 

20 emissions from all sources. 

21 Each state plan should step up to make 

22 sure that the steps taken in their plans do not 
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1 continue to disproportionately burden those who 

2 live near the plants. EPA should call on the 

3 states to address this issues specifically in 

4 their plans and develop some model approaches for 

5 the states to use and to be in the FIP that would 

6 recognize these concerns. 

7 In closing, the Clean Energy Incentive 

8 Program offers great opportunities for advancing 

9 action that will meet the target of the Clean 

10 Power Plan but their program could be stronger in 

11 the Model Rule and in the FIP so that they will 

12 best help the communities that they intend to 

13 serve. Thank you. 

14 MR. HARVEY: Thank you, Ms. Nolen, very 

15 much. 

16 Are there questions, comments? 

17 MR. CLOUSE: No. 

18 MR. HARVEY: Thank you. Our next speaker 

19 is Jessica Eckdish. If you would start by 

20 spelling your name, please? 

21 MS. ECKDISH: Sure. Good morning. My 

22 name is Jessica Eckdish. That's E-C-K-D-I-S-H. 
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1 And I am speaking today as a representative of 

2 the Sierra Club. 

3 I appreciate the opportunity to express 

4 support for the Clean Power Plan and comment on 

5 EPA's Proposed Federal Implementation Plan, or 

6 FIP. 

7 Fossil -- fossil fuel fired power plants 

8 are the single largest source of climate 

9 pollution in the United States, representing 40 

10 percent of our total CO2 emissions. Power plants 

11 also emit conventional and toxic air pollutants 

12 that contribute to respiratory and heart diseases 

13 as well as premature death. These emissions are, 

14 therefore, a significant driver of climate change 

15 and pollution in nearby communities. 

16 The Clean Power Plan finalized this 

17 summer sets the first ever carbon pollution 

18 standards for our country. These safeguards will 

19 protect our air, our water, our climate, and the 

20 health of our communities. 

21 By implementing these safeguards, the 

22 Clean Power Plan will lead to significant climate 
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1 and public health benefits. EPA has estimated 

2 that by 2030 the Clean Power Plan will prevent 

3 150,000 asthma attacks and up to 6,600 premature 

4 deaths annually. 

5 The standard is also critical to meeting 

6 our international climate goals, or INDC and 

7 providing, among other efforts, a solid 

8 foundation for U.S. climate leadership. But in 

9 order to truly achieve the benefits of this plan, 

10 the states must develop implementation plans with 

11 specific pollution controls tailored to local 

12 conditions. 

13 As the Clean Power Plan gives states the 

14 flexibility to decide the appropriate pollution 

15 reduction measures to meet the standard, it is 

16 critical that EPA be in a position to strongly 

17 uphold the emission reduction targets outlined in 

18 the Clean Power Plan. 

19 If a state fails to adopt and implement 

20 an adequate plan, EPA is required to issue and 

21 enforce a Federal Implementation Plan. States 

22 may also choose to accept the plan as an 
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1 alternative to developing their own plan. 

2 It is, therefore, critical for the health 

3 of our planet and our communities that EPA 

4 finalize a Federal Implementation Plan that is 

5 adequately strong and just. In order to ensure 

6 that the Model FIP is strong and just, there are 

7 five things EPA must ensure that the FIP covers. 

8 First, EPA should ensure that carbon 

9 pollution standards in the Model Federal Plan 

10 achieve the pollution reductions promised in the 

11 Final Clean Power Plan or even further 

12 reductions. 

13 Second, EPA should ensure that states 

14 address potential carbon pollution from new power 

15 plants to achieve overall electric sector 

16 reductions in carbon pollution. 

17 Third, EPA should protect low income 

18 consumers by maximizing utility's incentives to 

19 invest in energy efficiency which lowers 

20 household energy bills. 

21 Fourth, ensure that the Model Plan 

22 protects and benefits minority, low income, and 
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1 indigenous communities that have long borne the 

2 brunt of fossil fuel pollution. 

3 And lastly, resist give-aways of 

4 allowances to polluting sources. 

5 The Clean Power Plan will clean up our 

6 air and address climate pollution while also 

7 modernizing how we power our country and our 

8 economy, spurring innovation and creating 

9 thousands of jobs and billions of dollars in new 

10 investments. But it's critical that the backstop 

11 of the Federal Implementation Plan is strong and 

12 just so we can fully realize these benefits. 

13 Thank you for this opportunity to 

14 testify. I urge the EPA to swiftly finalize the 

15 Model FIP and protect our health and planet. 

16 Thank you. 

17 MR. HARVEY: Thank you, Ms. Eckdish. 

18 Would you mind repeating your second 

19 point? You were moving pretty quickly. 

20 MS. JONES: I was going to ask the same 

21 thing. 

22 MS. ECKDISH: Sure. Sorry about that. 
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1 MR. HARVEY: Well, good. Both of us have 

2 the same question. 

3 MS. ECKDISH: And these will be included 

4 in -- in submitted testimony as well. 

5 MR. HARVEY: Just read it more slowly. 

6 MS. ECKDISH: The second point is ensure 

7 that states address potential carbon pollution 

8 from new power plants to achieve overall electric 

9 sector reductions in carbon pollution. 

10 MR. HARVEY: Okay. Thank you. Thank you 

11 both. 

12 Our next pair of speakers are Anna 

13 Kasibhatla and Scott Burger. We'll begin with 

14 Ms. Kasib. When you're ready, please start by 

15 spelling your name and -- and then we'll start 

16 the timer. 

17 MS. KASIBHATLA: Absolutely. Anna, 

18 A-N-N-A, Kasibhatla, K-A-S-I-B-H-A-T-L-A. 

19 MR. HARVEY: Thank you. We're ready. 

20 MS. KASIBHATLA: Okay. I would like to 

21 begin by saying that this morning when I woke up, 

22 I had no idea that I would be testifying in front 
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1 of the EPA. I thank you for the accessibility of 

2 this platform for public participation in the 

3 policymaking process. 

4 Today I am asking the EPA to consider the 

5 moral and political obligation to maintain a 

6 strong and consistent position on climate action 

7 and to thank the EPA for this step forward in 

8 combating climate disruption. 

9 I feel that it is important to not 

10 appropriate the voices or stories that do not 

11 belong to me. So today I will be speaking to the 

12 ways in which climate change affects my life and 

13 my communities. As a student I feel an 

14 intellectual obligation to understand the complex 

15 processes and collective action problems that 

16 contribute to massive climate disruption, and to 

17 use the academic resources available to me to 

18 work to mitigate these devastating effects and to 

19 address the root causes of the problems rather 

20 than treating the symptoms, and to encourage my 

21 fellow students to do the same. 

22 As a person of faith, I feel a moral 
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1 obligation to act as a steward of a better earth, 

2 an earth renewed, an earth in which people of 

3 color and low income communities do not have to 

4 suffer from the effects of unmitigated emissions 

5 and problematic practices. 

6 As a daughter of the country of India, I 

7 feel fear and frustration at the climate 

8 injustices that displace the economically 

9 marginalized members of my communities such as 

10 drought and flooding. As a resident of North 

11 Carolina, I feel an obligation to voice the 

12 passions of my peers and community as we continue 

13 to observe and feel the adverse affects of 

14 hydraulic fracturing and sea level rise. 

15 As an activist in Washington, D.C., I 

16 feel called to empower and urge the EPA to 

17 implement effective policy solutions like the 

18 Clean Power Plan in order to mitigate the adverse 

19 affects of climate disruption, restore stability 

20 to those who have suffered from this disruption 

21 and to call on our leaders to prioritize climate 

22 disruption as a major area of concern worthy of 
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1 bold actions and generous attention. 

2 This issue threatens my generation. It 

3 threatens the world that I love, and it threatens 

4 the world that I hope for. 

5 Leaving you with these thoughts, I would 

6 like to thank the EPA again for its bold steps 

7 forward and to ask the EPA to continue to lead 

8 the fight against climate disruption. Thank you. 

9 MR. HARVEY: Thank you very much. 

10 Our next speaker, if you could start by 

11 spelling your name? 

12 MR. BURGER: Certainly. 

13 Good morning. My name is Scott Burger. 

14 It's B-U-R-G-E-R, like hamburger. 

15 I'm a citizen of the City of Richmond. I 

16 thank you for allowing me to speak today. I'm 

17 also a volunteer with the local Sierra Club, and 

18 I'm here to speak in support of the Clean Power 

19 Plan. 

20 Just a little bit about myself -- I grew 

21 up in Norfolk, Virginia, right near -- in a 

22 neighborhood right near the coal piers and coal 
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1 trains. And early on I was very aware of the 

2 coal dust that was being put out into my local 

3 environment. I -- although I don't suffer, 

4 myself, from asthma, I knew many people who did. 

5 It was a very prevalent problem which I do -- I 

6 think is directly related to the -- the coal that 

7 was coming through. And certainly I'm much more 

8 aware now of the threat of climate change to my 

9 former city. Sea level rise is definitely a 

10 threat. 

11 Like I said, I now live in Richmond. And 

12 unfortunately, it also has a huge prevalence of 

13 asthma. It's one of the asthma capitals in the 

14 United States. There's coal plants to our 

15 southwest which have an effect on our long-term 

16 health. There's also -- where I live in Richmond 

17 is surrounded by highways which I know is -- puts 

18 out a lot of its own CO2 and -- and a lot of its 

19 own health problems. And I know by living there 

20 I am having a direct impact on my long-term 

21 health. 

22 I also am aware that Richmond is -- is 
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1 redoing its port; and I'm also concerned about 

2 what that's going to mean in terms of clean air 

3 in Richmond. A lot of people aren't aware of how 

4 much these ships do have an effect on the air 

5 quality. 

6 But there are a lot of beneficial 

7 effects, I think, in addition in terms of 

8 ameliorating these problems but also other 

9 beneficial effects of the Clean Power Plan. One 

10 thing I am happy to say and one reason why I do 

11 still live in Richmond is the resurgence of 

12 wildlife, more specifically the fish in the James 

13 River. I think that can directly be related to 

14 efforts to clean up the air quality and water 

15 quality in Virginia. 

16 I'm also looking forward to seeing how 

17 this might have an impact on the transportation 

18 policy -- local transportation policy in 

19 particular. Right now Richmond's at a nexus 

20 where we see a lot of coal trains going from West 

21 Virginia to Norfolk, frankly, to maybe go to 

22 China. I don't know, but -- but it's -- it's a 
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1 real problem in that it stifles a lot of chances 

2 to do more with passenger rail. And I think once 

3 we address a lot of the problems with the coal 

4 industry and maybe that dissipates a bit more, 

5 we'll see more opportunities for high speed rail, 

6 passenger rail that will further clean up our 

7 highways. 

8 I'll also say that I'm a big believer in 

9 solar energy, distributed energy. Right now we 

10 have a -- pretty much monopoly with Dominion 

11 Power. We have a grid that's, frankly, almost 

12 antique. When we've seen hurricanes come through 

13 Richmond, my neighborhood, which is a stone's 

14 throw away from Dominion Power Headquarters has 

15 lost power for, you know, two weeks, which is 

16 ridiculous. And it has a big effect on a lot of 

17 the poorer neighborhoods in Richmond. 

18 And so, I think solar distributed energy 

19 will actually do a lot -- not just in terms of, 

20 again, affecting the fossil fuel use, but also 

21 having a more resilient grid. It has -- it has a 

22 huge effect, I think, in powering communities. I 
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1 put a solar on my house, and one of the side 

2 effects actually was improving the micro grid in 

3 my neighborhood to the point where Dominion had 

4 to come through and make sure that everyone had 

5 the right amount of voltage. And it was a much 

6 more resilient micro grid. 

7 So I think those are some of the other 

8 benefits of -- of supporting the Clean Power 

9 Plan. 

10 I think it needs to go further. I am 

11 concerned about some of the bad effects that bio 

12 mass, fracking, certainly nuclear power, waste 

13 incineration -- I agree very much with the Green 

14 Party that the Clean Power Plan is a great step, 

15 but it doesn't go far enough. And so, I'll leave 

16 it at that; but I am appreciative of the EPA's 

17 efforts. Thank you. 

18 MR. HARVEY: Thank you, Mr. Burger, for 

19 joining us from Richmond. Are there questions? 

20 All right. Thank you both. 

21 MR. BURGER: Thank you. 

22 MR. HARVEY: I will observe that I -- I 
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1 need some speaker cards. I don't have any at 

2 this point. 

3 (Pause.) 

4 Aha, here they come. 

5 (Pause.) 

6 Our next two speakers are Ivy Main and 

7 Lindsey Mendelson. Good morning. 

8 MS. MAIN: Good morning. My name is Ivy 

9 Main, I-V-Y, M-A-I-N. Thank you for the 

10 opportunity to speak to the Federal 

11 Implementation Plan. I am a resident of 

12 Virginia. I'm an energy policy analyst. I'm 

13 focused on Virginia energy law and policy. I'm 

14 also a volunteer with the Sierra Club, but I'm 

15 testifying on my own behalf today. 

16 First of all, I want to say how -- what a 

17 game changer the Clean Power Plan is even in a 

18 state like Virginia, and I know we basically got 

19 a pass on it. And our -- our analysis, we're -- 

20 we're basically -- if all we did was meet new 

21 demand with energy efficiency wind and solar, 

22 we'd be there. 
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1 So -- but that's sad. What it has done 

2 is change the conversation. All of a sudden 

3 carbon is no longer something that's kind of out 

4 there, maybe somebody will address it someday. 

5 It is now integral to our energy planning, and 

6 that is a major step forward in how people think. 

7 And I work very closely with the wind and solar 

8 industries, and they are very excited about the 

9 opportunities this will mean even in a state like 

10 Virginia which -- where we're not expecting huge 

11 things from the plan itself. It's just the way 

12 people are now addressing environmental issues, 

13 and carbon issues, and energy issues. And that's 

14 a tremendous change that we're seeing. 

15 The -- you had sort of asked -- I think 

16 because of my work in the south, I know there are 

17 a lot of states that are not in a hurry to do 

18 their own state plans, and so the Federal 

19 Implementation Plan is going to be very 

20 important, I think, not only for those states 

21 that aren't moving forward but also for states 

22 that really are slow and looking for guidance. 
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1 And so, the federal will -- plan -- will serve as 

2 a model for everybody. 

3 It seems to me you're going to have to 

4 have two plans. I know there was a question of 

5 whether you do one or two. Kind of from a legal 

6 point of view I don't see how you get away from 

7 doing the rate-based plan, but the mass-based 

8 plan is so much easier for people to understand; 

9 and I think it will be so much easier to do a 

10 trading scheme. So -- so, I think we'd like to 

11 see that as well. 

12 The -- the one thing that I really felt 

13 that the Clean Power Plan didn't handle as well 

14 as it could have is biomass. And we are seeing 

15 tremendous pressure on the forests of the 

16 southeast already on -- as a result of people 

17 burning woody biomass for power. And often 

18 because Renewable Portfolio Standards allow 

19 certain levels of biomass, that has been a 

20 problem. There's no reason for a federal plan to 

21 get into that quagmire. 

22 And you -- in the next 15 years during 
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1 the time period of the Clean Power Plan, there's 

2 no CO2 benefit to burning woody biomass. In 

3 fact, we're losing the abilities of the forest to 

4 sequester carbon, so it's a net negative. And 

5 so, I would urge the EPA to leave biomass out of 

6 it there. I don't think there's any easy way to 

7 bring biomass, especially woody biomass, into it. 

8 And -- and there's so much to be said for keeping 

9 this as simple and straightforward as possible. 

10 And the last thing that I wanted to raise 

11 -- and I saw Matt Clouse at the Maryland, D.C., 

12 Virginia Solar Energy Industries Association 

13 meeting over the last two days, but there is a 

14 lot of excitement among the solar industry but 

15 also a feeling that when it comes to setting up 

16 the RECs and the ERC -- the ERC market, it's 

17 really important to keep this simple. 

18 And the trading is going to be a big part 

19 of this. It's a big part of what's going to help 

20 renewable energy. If -- if the REC market 

21 doesn't transition easily to an ERC market, we're 

22 losing opportunities. So, we have to be really 
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1 careful to not just keep it simple but ensure 

2 that if you've got some -- somebody holding an 

3 ERC, there shouldn't be somebody else holding a 

4 REC for that same unit of power because 

5 somebody's missing the point if that happens. 

6 I realize, you know, poor RPS laws mean 

7 that there are now -- there is now a big 

8 opportunity for overlap, but I think a good 

9 trading plan from EPA can resolve that. 

10 I see my time is up, so I'll stop. Thank 

11 you. 

12 MR. HARVEY: Thank you, Ms. Main. 

13 MS. JONES: Hi. Thank you. Earlier you 

14 noted the need for both the rate and a mass-based 

15 approach in finalizing the federal plans. Could 

16 you elaborate on just exactly how you see or 

17 would envision a dual approach federal plan 

18 working? 

19 And the second piece -- second part of 

20 the question would be could you also elaborate on 

21 the legal concerns that you noted with finalizing 

22 just one of the two approaches? 
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1 MR. HARVEY: Maybe before you answer, if 

2 you could be clear about whether you were 

3 referring to finalizing two model rules, or as -- 

4 as Toni was suggesting that we -- 

5 MS. KASIBHATLA: I -- I guess my concern 

6 is that the -- the legal foundation -- and I have 

7 to say I -- I am a lawyer, but I have not studied 

8 this myself, so my understanding is that the 

9 legal foundation of the Clean Power Plan is 

10 really based on the per plant approach which 

11 means that I think the rate-based approach is on 

12 the strongest legal grounds, but we're hearing a 

13 lot of states are interested in the mass-based 

14 approach. And so I would want the federal 

15 approach to make it as easy as possible to set up 

16 these trading regimes. And that's why we'd want 

17 to see a mass-based approach offered, but I -- 

18 but I would think that you would then need to 

19 have the rate-based approach to address the 

20 concerns. But -- but I'm -- you know, I'm not an 

21 expert on that, so I -- I would not want to hold 

22 myself out on that. 
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1 I just want to make this as easy as 

2 possible for a lot of states that really need 

3 guidance on it and are going to be looking to the 

4 EPA for a model rule. 

5 MS. JONES: Thank you for the 

6 clarification. 

7 MR. HARVEY: Our next speaker is Lindsey 

8 Mendelson. Please start by spelling your name. 

9 MS. MENDELSON: Hello. My name is 

10 spelled L-I-N-D-S-E-Y, M-E-N-D-E-L-S-O-N. And 

11 I'm a Global Warming Solutions Fellow with 

12 Environment America. 

13 Thanks to the EPA, and the Obama 

14 Administration, and to the President for moving 

15 forward with the Clean Power Plan and limiting 

16 global warming pollution from power plants, the 

17 single largest source of pollution in the United 

18 States, is a critical step forward to protect our 

19 children from the worst impacts of climate 

20 change. 

21 On behalf of Environment America I really 

22 appreciate this opportunity to write feedback on 
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1 the draft Model Rule for States and the Draft 

2 Federal Implementation Plan. 

3 Every day it becomes clearer that global 

4 warming is happening now, and it's already 

5 hitting too close to home. In fact, we released 

6 a report last week in dozens of states, and our 

7 study found that 96 percent of Americans live in 

8 counties that have been recently impacted by 

9 Federally declared weather disasters. And these 

10 -- many of these weather events have become more 

11 frequent and more severe in a warming world. 

12 And from the drought in California to 

13 extreme rainfall in South Carolina and to 

14 historic flooding in Texas, these signs show that 

15 we need to act urgently; and -- and that's why 

16 it's imperative that we implement the Clean Power 

17 Plan as quickly as possible and accelerate our 

18 transition to clean energy. 

19 We know that global warming is largely 

20 caused by carbon pollution, and we should do 

21 everything in our power to invest in energy 

22 resources that do not contribute to global 
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1 warming. 

2 States across the country have the vast 

3 potential to shift to clean energy. For 

4 instance, America has a potential to power itself 

5 10 times over with the wind that blows both over 

6 our land and the east coast. And Virginia has an 

7 excellent potential to develop offshore and wind 

8 energy farms; and Georgia can utilize its coastal 

9 areas for offshore wind. 

10 The United States also has the potential 

11 to produce more than 100 times as much 

12 electricity from solar PV and concentrating solar 

13 power installations as the nation consumes each 

14 year. In fact, each of the 50 states has a 

15 potential to generate far more electricity from 

16 the sun than its residents consume. 

17 Across the nation last year a home or a 

18 business installed a solar energy system every 

19 2.5 minutes. According to the last solar jobs 

20 census from the Solar Foundation, the solar 

21 industry employed more than 170,000 people last 

22 year and remains among the most rapidly growing 
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1 sectors in the U.S. economy. 

2 In addition to that, Colorado has solar 

3 potential to power the entire state 362 times 

4 over; and Virginia could actually produce nearly 

5 20 times as much power as it uses through solar 

6 energy. 

7 And energy efficiency offers vast 

8 untapped potential to get more done using less 

9 electricity. It's actually our cheapest and 

10 quickest tool to prevent global warming 

11 pollution. And -- and the American Council for 

12 Energy Efficient Economy estimates that we could 

13 actually reduce overall energy use from our 

14 economy by 40 to 60 percent by 2050. And even as 

15 our economy grows by deploying better technology 

16 in our buildings industry in our homes, and in 

17 investing in these energy efficiency programs on 

18 this scale would create more than a million jobs 

19 and boost our economy on the order of hundreds of 

20 millions of dollars per year. 

21 In order to address the climate crisis we 

22 need to accelerate towards 100 percent clean 
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1 energy. As the EPA finalizes the Model Rule and 

2 the Federal Implementation Plan, we strongly 

3 encourage you to ensure that these programs 

4 encourage investment in clean energy resources 

5 such as wind, solar, and energy efficiency as 

6 much as possible. 

7 I have a few specific recommendations on 

8 the proposed Model Rule and the Federal Plan. 

9 The faster that the EPA can finalize the Model 

10 Rule and the more certainty states have as they 

11 develop their compliance plan, the quicker they 

12 can move forward. And that's why we urge the EPA 

13 to consider while there are some components of 

14 the rule can be finalized shortly after the 

15 comment period closes. 

16 And the EPA should also apply the Federal 

17 Plan provisions swiftly and should a state 

18 decline to adequately care out its 

19 responsibilities. 

20 We support EPA's proposal to issue a 

21 federal plan for any state that does not meet one 

22 of their interim state planning milestones, and 
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1 we urge the EPA to do this less than one year 

2 after finding that the state is not on track to 

3 submit a final state plan. 

4 Finally, the EPA must ensure that all 

5 affected power plants abide by enforceable limits 

6 on their emissions of global warming pollution by 

7 applying effective accountability mechanisms. 

8 Thank you again for the opportunity to 

9 speak. I really appreciate EPA's effort in 

10 moving forward with this proposal, and I urge you 

11 to move swiftly in cleaning up our nation's power 

12 plants. 

13 MR. HARVEY: Thank you, Ms. Mendelson. 

14 Thank you both. 

15 Our next pair of speakers are Jacqueline 

16 Lowe and Joelle Novey. 

17 Let's start with Ms. Lowe. If you -- if 

18 you could first start by spelling your name? 

19 MS. LOWE: Hi, my name is Jacqueline 

20 Lowe. That's spelled J-A-C-Q-U-E-L-I-N-E, Lowe, 

21 L-O-W-E. 

22 Good afternoon. Again, my name is 
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1 Jacqueline. I came here today from Chesapeake, 

2 Virginia, with the Sierra Club as a volunteer. 

3 And I'd like to thank you for the opportunity to 

4 offer comment. 

5 The Clean Power Plan is a historical 

6 juncture for this country, bringing with it a 

7 chance for us to move forward into the future of 

8 clean energy. 

9 The Federal Implementation Plan will be 

10 the model for each state to create plans to 

11 ensure that everyone reaps the benefits of the 

12 environmental, economic, and social benefits of 

13 reducing our carbon emissions. 

14 But, what exactly does that mean? Well, 

15 for me it's pretty life changing. I believe 

16 clean energy is the future. I believe it so much 

17 that I recently got a degree in environmental 

18 studies. 

19 When you hear about all the statistics of 

20 jobs that will be created, I'm one of the people 

21 who's going to benefit from those jobs. I'm one 

22 of many, probably many in this room. 
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1 I live in a coastal region. My home is 

2 at risk to the threats of climate change. That 

3 risk is reduced when plans like this -- strong 

4 clean power plans -- are in effect to help tackle 

5 climate change. 

6 I am not a mother, but I probably will be 

7 some day. And I don't want to give my future 

8 child a destroyed world. How will I explain that 

9 we had the opportunity, but we didn't make a 

10 strong enough plan? This isn't something for 

11 future generations to deal with. This is 

12 something for us to deal with now while we have 

13 the opportunity. 

14 And I believe that we can succeed. I 

15 believe that we can reduce our carbon emissions. 

16 We can provide a healthier, more sustainable 

17 place for us and for our future generations to 

18 live. We can have jobs. We can have growth but 

19 not if this Federal Implementation Plan isn't 

20 strong and just. And let's be honest -- this 

21 could be a giant step in the right direction, but 

22 there's also a risk of failing if we don't set 
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1 the bar high enough. 

2 In order to ensure that the draft Model 

3 Federal Plan is strong and just, the EPA must 

4 ensure the carbon pollution standards in the 

5 Model Federal Plan achieve the pollution 

6 reductions promised in the Final Clean Power Plan 

7 or even further reductions, ensure that states 

8 address potential carbon pollution from new power 

9 plants to achieve overall electric sector 

10 reductions in carbon pollution, protect low 

11 income consumers by maximizing utilities' 

12 incentives to invest in efficiency which lowers 

13 household energy bills. 

14 I'm thrilled that we've started taking 

15 steps to being -- to addressing climate change 

16 and our impact with greenhouse gases. I'm 

17 excited to see the economic growth that will stem 

18 from this plan. 

19 As a consumer, I'm looking forward to a 

20 market that provides more options for renewable 

21 energy sources such as Aesop Technologies. I 

22 hope that we're making these changes in time to 
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1 reduce the effects of climate change. I strongly 

2 believe that this is our opportunity, this is our 

3 chance, and we need to implement a strong and 

4 just Clean Power Plan, something that everyone 

5 can follow. Thank you for your time. 

6 MR. HARVEY: Thank you, Ms. Lowe. 

7 Ms. Novey, if you could start by spelling 

8 your name. 

9 MS. NOVEY: Joelle Novey, J-O-E-L-L-E; 

10 Novey, N-O-V-E-Y. 

11 Good morning. My name is Joelle Novey, 

12 and I work with hundreds of congregations across 

13 this region who are responding to climate change 

14 through Interfaith Power and Light. We are one 

15 of 40 state affiliates of Interfaith Power and 

16 Light engaging faith communities nationally in 

17 caring for creation. I am only one of many faith 

18 voices you will hear at today and tomorrow's 

19 hearings. Cecelia kicked things off this morning 

20 with her message on behalf of the U.S. Conference 

21 of Catholic Bishops. 

22 Our faith communities are called to care 
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1 for our neighbors by addressing the heat-trapping 

2 pollution that is damaging our climate. And so 

3 we've been vocal champions around the country 

4 throughout the entire process of the EPA 

5 formulating and enacting the Clean Power Plan. 

6 At every step of this process, at every 

7 hearing faith voices spoke out. We twice held 

8 prayer circles outside this building to send 

9 blessings to this process. We delivered 

10 thousands of comments in support of the Clean 

11 Power Plan collected by folks in their 

12 congregations who set up card tables after 

13 services. 

14 Leaders from diverse faith traditions 

15 have stood at this table -- sat at this table -- 

16 again and again to give voice to the moral 

17 importance of setting carbon pollution limits 

18 from power plants. 

19 I, personally, have traveled to this room 

20 repeatedly over the last few years and feel very 

21 at home here. Some of the EPA staff people 

22 checked me in look familiar to me at this point, 
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1 and I knew exactly where I could find an outlet 

2 in this room to charge my cell phone. 

3 So, first, this morning I want to say 

4 thank you to the EPA for the Clean Power Plan. I 

5 don't know how many more times I'm going to get 

6 to testify about it, so I might not have a chance 

7 to say that again. Thank you. 

8 What do faith communities have to offer 

9 today at this hearing on the federal 

10 implementation of the plan? Well, our 

11 communities have a deep understanding that we can 

12 only solve big problems if everyone does their 

13 part. Whether we're joining our voices to sing 

14 in harmony or each bringing a pot luck dish to 

15 create an abundant meal, our congregations 

16 understand that we each have a responsibility to 

17 do our own share of the sacred work that faces 

18 us. 

19 In my own Jewish community we can only do 

20 the most important prayers when a quorum of 10 

21 people are present. It is everyone showing up 

22 that creates the sacred space. Only by working 
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1 together can our congregations fulfill their holy 

2 purpose. 

3 As the U.N. Climate Negotiations in Paris 

4 approach, faith voices are calling for our nation 

5 to be good neighbors, to do our part as one of 

6 the world's major climate polluters and to 

7 address some of the harm we've already caused for 

8 our global neighbors by contributing to the Green 

9 Climate Fund. 

10 And here at home doing our part means 

11 making sure that every state participates in the 

12 good work of reducing carbon pollution. The 

13 faith communities I work with in Virginia and in 

14 Maryland are joining with many other caring folks 

15 to speak out for climate action and strong state 

16 implementation. They're asking our governors to 

17 support strong state plans. They're cheering on 

18 our Attorneys General when they defend the Clean 

19 Power Plan in court. They are calling on their 

20 Congressional leadership to defend the Clean 

21 Power Plan from a tax in Congress. And we're 

22 working every day in our own communities to walk 
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1 the talk by using less energy and shifting to 

2 clean energy in our own congregations and homes. 

3 But there are 48 other states besides Virginia 

4 and Maryland, and our communities understand that 

5 we will not succeed unless everyone does their 

6 part. 

7 The Federal Implementation Plan ensures 

8 that absolutely every state in our union does 

9 their part to act on climate. On behalf of so 

10 many good folks in faith communities who 

11 understand the importance of working together, 

12 please approve the Federal Implementation of the 

13 Clean Power Plan. 

14 MR. HARVEY: Thank you, Ms. Novey. Okay. 

15 Thank you both. 

16 (Discussion off the record.) 

17 MR. HARVEY: Our next speakers, I have 

18 Kendyl Crawford and Pete Johnson. 

19 Give me one second. We're just sorting 

20 out this. 

21 (Discussion off the record.) 

22 MR. HARVEY: All right. Sorry for that 
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1 delay. 

2 So let's start with Kendyl Crawford and 

3 then Pete Johnson. So if you could start by 

4 spelling your name. 

5 MS. CRAWFORD: Kendyl, K-E-N-D-Y-L; 

6 Crawford, C-R-A-W-F-O-R-D. 

7 Thank you so much for the opportunity to 

8 speak and express my opinion today. Again, my 

9 name is Kendyl Crawford; and I live in Richmond, 

10 Virginia. I am a Conservation Program 

11 Coordinator with the Virginia Chapter of the 

12 Sierra Club, but my comments are my own today. 

13 I am here to applaud the Clean Power 

14 Plan, realizing that it is an important and 

15 historic step in cutting carbon emissions from 

16 our nation's power plants. 

17 I grew up in the Hampton Roads region of 

18 Virginia, and according to a fairly recent report 

19 by Dr. James Hansen, longtime Chief Climatologist 

20 for NASA and current Adjunct Professor at 

21 Columbia, there is a serious threat of rapid sea 

22 level rise this century. Hansen and I believe 16 
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1 other notable researchers who also co-authored 

2 this study, they're worried that sea level rise 

3 of around 10 feet is possible by 2100 on current 

4 trajectories compared to the IPCC predictions of 

5 3 feet for that same time scale. 

6 As a young person this is horrifying as I 

7 expect to be alive for the majority of this 

8 century. And the home where I grew up and my 

9 mother continues to live in Hampton, Virginia, is 

10 only about 10 feet above sea level. Hampton 

11 Roads, as you've heard a little bit earlier 

12 today, is the second most vulnerable area to sea 

13 level rise in the United States, right after New 

14 Orleans. By immediately reducing carbon 

15 emissions in addition to more short-lived 

16 greenhouse gases, we can slow sea level rise. 

17 In the event that a state fails to 

18 develop and adopt its own state implementation 

19 plan, I would encourage the EPA's Federal 

20 Implementation Plan to have the urgency of the 

21 climate crisis reflected in the timeline and to 

22 encourage the development of clean renewable 
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1 energy in addition to energy efficiency with an 

2 eye to spur innovation and create jobs. 

3 A Federal Implementation Plan must also 

4 be just and equitable, prioritizing the physical 

5 and economic health of citizens over corporate 

6 polluter interests which means decreasing burdens 

7 on communities and reasonable household energy 

8 bills. 

9 Additionally, in the development of this 

10 plan I hope for deep and sustained engagement 

11 with the communities that are located closest to 

12 our power plants and experience the brunt of the 

13 negative effects of the societal necessity of 

14 power production. 

15 Lastly, I encourage the EPA to make sure 

16 the federal plan at least stays true to the goals 

17 set in the Final Clean Power Plan and at best 

18 surpasses them. Thank you. 

19 MR. HARVEY: Thank you very much. 

20 Okay. Mr. Johnson, could you start by 

21 spelling your name, please? 

22 MR. JOHNSON: Sure. My name is Peter 
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1 Johnson, P-E-T-E-R, J-O-H-N-S-O-N. 

2 First, I want to thank you for the 

3 opportunity to speak today. I'm here to speak in 

4 favor of the Clean Power Plan. I am the 

5 Executive Director of Project Green and Gray. 

6 It's a non-profit that is working in key states 

7 to bring the voice of those 50 years and older 

8 for climate solutions. 

9 I started this group because, like many 

10 who are 50 years and older, I'm a parent, and I 

11 have a duty to my children, my future 

12 grandchildren; and I feel I have a duty to the 

13 generations to come. Project Green and Gray 

14 supports the Clean Power Plan because it is the 

15 action that we have been working for. More 

16 action is needed to truly address the climate 

17 crisis, but the Clean Power Plan is the best most 

18 strategic place to start. 

19 Parents and grandparents over the course 

20 of raising their children do countless big and 

21 small things to ensure their kids have a chance 

22 to experience all that life has to offer. They 
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1 do these often difficult things with joyful and 

2 grateful -- with a joyful and grateful heart 

3 because they can do no less. And they feel the 

4 same way about their grandchildren. 

5 Many of these same people are making the 

6 connection that the work is not done unless we 

7 ensure a livable planet for their children and 

8 all children and grandchildren. It is an 

9 unprecedented challenge, no doubt. As my Irish 

10 mother liked to say, many hands make for light 

11 work. Collecting these many hands is the 

12 challenges for a group like ours. 

13 The Clean Power Plan is our best chance 

14 to address the largest source of carbon pollution 

15 in climate change. Let me tell you why the Clean 

16 Power Plan has the support of many groups, 

17 including Project Green and Gray, and many of 

18 those 50 years and older that care about the 

19 world we are handing to current and future 

20 generations. 

21 Clean Power Plan gives states the 

22 opportunity to create their own customized plan. 
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1 States will have a maximum flexibility to design 

2 their own plans in a cost effective way -- 

3 something I know that many governors have 

4 expressed is important to them. 

5 And the states have a tremendous 

6 opportunity to lead in the clean energy 

7 development which means jobs for all ages, cut 

8 electricity bills, and protect public health by 

9 reducing carbon pollution. 

10 The proposed Federal Implementation Plan 

11 will be good for those states that are willing to 

12 meet carbon pollution reduction targets in this 

13 plan. For states that do not create their own 

14 plans to cut carbon pollution from power plants, 

15 the EPA -- you have provided a federal guaranty 

16 for reducing carbon pollution and protecting 

17 public health, provides help to states that 

18 decide to forgo creating an individual plan based 

19 on sound science and aimed at protecting public 

20 health from the power plant carbon pollution. 

21 This proposed plan will also serve as a model 

22 plan states can use as a resource to develop 
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1 their own plans. However, states should control 

2 the process and seize the opportunity to create 

3 their own plans to reduce carbon pollution in the 

4 most cost effective way. They should not ignore 

5 the law and leave it only to the -- to EPA. 

6 And why? Why should they do that? 

7 Because governors know what is best for their 

8 states. That is why this plan places states in 

9 control when it comes to reducing carbon from 

10 power plants. 

11 Some Congressional climate deniers, 

12 including the Senate Majority Leader, Mitch 

13 McConnell, has urged states to defy the law and 

14 refuse to create a plan to comply with the Clean 

15 Power Plan, and this is wrong. States should 

16 instead ignore Senator McConnell because his only 

17 goal is to dismantle these lifesaving and common 

18 sense environmental protections. 

19 States rights are best protected when 

20 governors and other local leaders make the 

21 decisions about how to protect their constituents 

22 from pollution. 
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1 Project Green and Gray will continue to 

2 work to support the Clean Power Plan. We hope 

3 that all see the problem and that those that do 

4 will support this plan. Our group has a motto, 

5 and I think it sums up our feeling. It says, 

6 their future, our legacy. Thank you very much 

7 for this time. 

8 MR. HARVEY: Thank you, Mr. Johnson. 

9 Thank you both. 

10 Our next two speakers are Nisha Witt and 

11 Zoe Berkeru [phonetic]. 

12 Ms. Witt, if you could start by spelling 

13 your name. 

14 MS. WITT: Nisha, N-I-S-H-A; Witt, 

15 W-I-T-T. 

16 MR. HARVEY: Ready when you are. 

17 MS. WITT: One of the first things that 

18 come to mind when you hear Norfolk, Virginia, the 

19 military, industrialization, or just another city 

20 by the sea. For many it is all of -- all of 

21 those things, but for me it is my home. Where I 

22 live I am surrounded by greenery and life that is 
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1 not seen by many on a daily basis. Like great 

2 white Egrets swooping and diving over and around 

3 my house or mallard ducks coming to visit every 

4 spring in my front yard. It's the little things 

5 like this that make me appreciate the type of 

6 environment that I live in. 

7 On top of everything I live right next to 

8 a bank that feeds off of Lafayette River which 

9 then feeds off the Chesapeake Bay. The pro? It 

10 brings vitality to my neighborhood. The con? 

11 When it rains, it pours. Whenever Hampton Roads 

12 is at risk of excessive flooding, it seems like 

13 the water is very quick to rush inland, but it 

14 takes very slowly to recede. 

15 With the facts in evidence of climate 

16 change, not by national top scientists but by 

17 residents, neighbors, and business owners, this 

18 is something that is very real for Virginians; 

19 and it needs to be addressed immediately and 

20 accordingly. 

21 Because (cleared throat) -- sorry. 

22 Because if we don't start holding people -- the 
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1 right parties accountable for resolving our 

2 environmental issues, many people that live in 

3 cities like Norfolk will not only lose their 

4 homes but their businesses, but most importantly, 

5 their city's history. 

6 As an owner of a solar technology start7 up, the ideas and implementations of renewable 

8 energy is very deterring in the State of 

9 Virginia. Innovative technologies are steadily 

10 emerging from other parts of the world, and 

11 people are benefitting from its use. However, in 

12 my state I steadily have to wear their shirt, 

13 which I wear very proudly, by the way, and tell 

14 my local and state government officials to stop 

15 supporting energies that are not only hazardous 

16 to my health but also to the environment. 

17 With the Clean Power Plan we need to 

18 crack down on existing power companies to stop 

19 taking the easy way out by using what they call 

20 quote, unquote, clean natural gas and start 

21 getting serious about investing in some renewable 

22 energy. 
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1 Also, I would like to see opportunities 

2 and incentives for start-ups and companies with 

3 the intent to act as renewable and clean utility 

4 companies and that we can provide power to those 

5 who are unable to invest in solar technology 

6 themselves. 

7 My company, Aesop Technologies, obtains a 

8 system that is not only powerful but also 

9 affordable to those with incentives. One of my 

10 biggest fears is that a company such as mine will 

11 never show their talents or their technologies as 

12 long as we are standing in the shadows of big 

13 corporations that benefit from dead dinosaurs. 

14 First off, I want to say thank you for 

15 passing the Clean Power Plan to provide light -- 

16 no pun intended -- to renewable technology 

17 companies that have the hope of providing 

18 products that they know will be appreciated and 

19 utilized by many. 

20 So I urge the EPA to please help us make 

21 this place look better -- to make this place 

22 better than it was yesterday by strengthening and 
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1 enforcing the Clean Power Plan. Thank you. 

2 MR. HARVEY: Thank you. 

3 MR. CLOUSE: Could you spell for me the 

4 name of your company? 

5 MS. WITT: Sorry. Say again? 

6 MR. CLOUSE: Could you spell for me the 

7 name of your company? 

8 MS. WITT: It's Aesop, A-E-S-O-P. 

9 MR. HARVEY: And -- and could you 

10 elaborate a little bit on what your company does? 

11 I wasn't clear exactly. 

12 MS. WITT: So, we specialize in solar 

13 technology. Currently we just acquired a 

14 technology for solar concentrated dishes. And 

15 what I am trying to do is that provide solar 

16 concentrated dishes for individualized homes that 

17 are like similar to the size of cable satellite 

18 dishes and where with precision tracking we can 

19 provide efficiency at 24 percent and lower cost 

20 -- pretty much energy bills by 30 to 40 percent. 

21 MR. CLOUSE: Thank you. 

22 MR. HARVEY: Okay. We're ready. You can 
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1 start by spelling your name. 

2 MS. BERKERY: Sure. I'm Zoe Berkery. 

3 That's 

4 Z-O-E and then B-E-R-K-E-R-Y. I think there was 

5 a typo -- 

6 MR. HARVEY: Yes, it looked like a U, 

7 sorry. 

8 MS. BERKERY: -- originally. Yes, they 

9 had Berkeru. No, Berkery. 

10 Thank you for the opportunity to 

11 participate in this public hearing on the 

12 Proposed Federal Plan and Model Rules under the 

13 Final Clean Power Plan for regulating carbon 

14 emissions from existing power plants. 

15 My name is Zoe Berkery, and I'm Manager 

16 of Federal Policy at the Business Council for 

17 Sustainable Energy. BCSE is a coalition of 

18 companies and trade associations from the energy 

19 efficiency and renewable energy and natural gas 

20 sectors and also includes independent electric 

21 power producers and investor on utilities, 

22 equipment and product manufacturers, project 
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1 developers, and energy and environmental service 

2 providers. Founded in 1992 the Council advocates 

3 for the policies at the state, national, and 

4 international levels that increase the use of 

5 commercially available clean energy technologies, 

6 products, and services. 

7 The coalition's diverse membership is 

8 united around the revitalization of the economy 

9 and the creation of a secure and sustainable 

10 energy future for America. BCSE believes that a 

11 properly designed federal plan can help those 

12 states that are not able to submit a compliance 

13 plan to move towards a more diverse, affordable, 

14 and clean energy portfolio that meets the Clean 

15 Power Plan's emissions reduction targets. 

16 In addition, the Federal Plan can serve 

17 as guidance to states in developing their own 

18 plans and as a temporary or partial plan where 

19 state plan development may be delayed or may not 

20 be addressed at all -- or may not address all 

21 issues. 

22 The Federal Plan, like any state plan, 
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1 can best achieve the goals of the Clean Power 

2 Plan by harnessing the vast potential of the wide 

3 range of clean energy technologies -- renewable 

4 energy, energy efficiency, and natural gas to 

5 improve reliability, increase flexibility, and 

6 produce energy savings as well as reduce 

7 emissions. 

8 BCSE intends to provide EPA with the 

9 necessary recommendations on design principles 

10 that will allow the Federal Plan to make use of 

11 the full suite of clean energy technologies for 

12 maximum benefits. 

13 In considering compliance options for 

14 both the Final Rule and the Proposed Federal 

15 Plan, it is important to evaluate them based on 

16 the emissions profile of the state or the region 

17 where the investment is being made. 

18 At this time BCSE would like to offer the 

19 following preliminary recommendations for the 

20 Federal Plan. The Federal Plan should adopt a 

21 trade-ready approach that should consider market22 based elements to ensure cost effective 
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1 compliance. The plan should consider the full 

2 portfolio of clean energy technologies and 

3 resources for planning. This includes ratepayer 

4 and non ratepayer programs and actions, including 

5 third-party delivered energy efficiency whether 

6 implemented mass-based complementary programs or 

7 integrated rate-based compliance programs. 

8 Further, if the Federal Plan allocates or 

9 auctions allowances under its plan, it should 

10 provide allowance value to clean energy 

11 technologies and resources to spur further 

12 investment and provide clean energy market 

13 signals. 

14 The plan and the Draft Model Plan should 

15 consider how set asides can be used to foster 

16 increased deployment of energy efficiency and 

17 renewable energy. This is something BCSE members 

18 are considering and will provide more detail on 

19 this topic in our formal comments. 

20 EPA should allow the same range of 

21 compliance actions under the Federal Plan that 

22 are available to states developing their own 
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1 plans. 

2 Utilizing a diverse portfolio of clean 

3 energy options available for compliance will make 

4 the U.S. economy stronger, reduce emissions, and 

5 increase resiliency. EPA should affirmatively 

6 indicate that technologies, resources, and 

7 practices that are not included in the building 

8 blocks can be eligible as compliance actions for 

9 states in addition to energy efficiency efforts. 

10 Through the Federal Plan states should be 

11 encouraged to support local government's 

12 investments in renewable energy and other clean 

13 energy and greenhouse gas mitigating facilities 

14 to avert net or off-system carbon increases. 

15 In addition we urge the EPA to recognize 

16 waste derived feed stocks as acceptable fuels for 

17 qualified biomass facilities. For energy 

18 efficiency activities EPA should consider 

19 defining compliance crediting mechanisms similar 

20 to renewable energy certificates or RECs. 

21 Translating energy savings into carbon savings is 

22 already in practice in independent system 
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1 operator's accounting mechanisms such as the PJM 

2 Environmental Informational Services, generation 

3 attribute tracking system, or G-A-T-S, GATS. 

4 These systems report emissions data associated 

5 with the generation mix for the region and can be 

6 used as verifiable proxy to count emission 

7 reductions due to energy efficiency projects. 

8 In addition, evaluation measurement and 

9 verification or EMV requirements for energy 

10 efficiency initiatives need to be verifiable, but 

11 they should not be too burdensome or costly which 

12 could discourage states from adopting robust 

13 energy efficiency programs and projects in their 

14 plans. 

15 In regard to the Clean Energy Incentives 

16 Program, EPA should consider expanding 

17 eligibility of investments, for instance, by 

18 adjusting the date to foster clean energy 

19 investments earlier or by altering definitions to 

20 provide more opportunity for demand side 

21 management and transmission and distribution 

22 measures which are proven tools for improving 
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1 energy efficiency and benefitting low income 

2 communities. 

3 Further, the design of the CEIP should 

4 include procedures to measure and verify energy 

5 savings or zero or low carbon generation. 

6 Thank you for the opportunity to make 

7 these comments on the Proposed Federal Plan under 

8 the Clean Power Plan. BCSE would like to be 

9 viewed as a resource to EPA during this process 

10 to help ensure the full portfolio of clean energy 

11 technologies and their full emissions reduction 

12 potential are recognized in the Federal Plan. 

13 Thank you. 

14 MR. HARVEY: Thank you very much. That 

15 was very timely. You've managed to hit five 

16 minutes exactly. 

17 MS. BERKERY: Yes, made it right on time. 

18 MR. HARVEY: You'll be providing written 

19 -- the written statement as well? 

20 MS. BERKERY: Yes, I provided it up 

21 front, but I have another copy if you'd like me 

22 to -- 
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1 MR. HARVEY: That would be fine. 

2 MS. BERKERY: Let me go get it. 

3 MR. HARVEY: Questions? 

4 MR. CLOUSE: I do. I do have a quick 

5 questions, Ms. Berkery. 

6 MS. BERKERY: Uh-huh. 

7 MR. CLOUSE: You talked about using GATS 

8 as a way to verify the savings from energy 

9 efficiency. Can you -- 

10 MS. BERKERY: Oh, the G-A-T-S, GATS? 

11 MR. CLOUSE: Yes, yes. 

12 MS. BERKERY: So, that was actually -- 

13 MR. CLOUSE: So you're talking about 

14 using tracking systems, the available tracking 

15 systems as a way to verify the savings from 

16 energy efficiency and generation from renewable 

17 energy? Is that what -- 

18 MS. BERKERY: Right. That was an example 

19 that PJM currently uses, and I can -- and if 

20 you'd like me to get more information from our 

21 member that provided that statement to include, I 

22 can. 
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1 MR. CLOUSE: I just was curious. That's 

2 -- I wanted to make sure I understood what you 

3 were saying. 

4 MS. BERKERY: Oh, yes, yes. So it's a 

5 PJM program and -- 

6 MR. CLOUSE: Yes. 

7 MS. BERKERY: -- yes. 

8 MR. CLOUSE: Okay. Thanks. 

9 MS. BERKERY: Thank you. 

10 MR. HARVEY: Thank you. Okay. So, what 

11 I’m going to do is we have a couple people who 

12 have signed up at specific times that are a 

13 little bit farther down the road, but if you're 

14 here, I'll call you now; and then we'll turn to 

15 people who signed up and who weren't -- didn't 

16 have a specific assigned times. 

17 So, Ernie Reed and Linda Burchfield 

18 [sic], if you're here, please join us. 

19 Okay. Let's start with Ernie Reed. If 

20 you could start by spelling your name for the 

21 reporter? 

22 MR. REED: My name is Ernest Reed, Jr., 
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1 E-R-N-E-S-T, R-double E-D, Jr. 

2 MR. HARVEY: Thank you. We're ready. 

3 MR. REED: I'm speaking on behalf of 

4 Virginia Organizing, Friends of Nelson, and Wild 

5 Virginia. 

6 Thank you for the opportunity to speak 

7 today. Wild Virginia advocates for conservation 

8 and preservation of Virginia's National Forests; 

9 Friends of Nelson for the protection of community 

10 and natural resources in Nelson County, Virginia, 

11 and Virginia Organizing who made my testimony 

12 today possible. 

13 In speaking today on the EPA Clean Power 

14 Plan I'm going to focus on how this plan in its 

15 current form is ultimately a direct threat to us. 

16 The EPA Clean Power Plan has been proposed at 

17 exactly the same time that an excess supply of 

18 natural gas is available in the Marcellus Shale 

19 region of West Virginia, Ohio, and Pennsylvania. 

20 This supply of gas is available only because of 

21 fracking technologies that have been ruled exempt 

22 from the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act, and 
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1 the Safe Drinking Water Act. 

2 As a result, there is an incentive for 

3 energy companies to extract natural gas as 

4 quickly as possible and to greatly increase 

5 natural gas infrastructure to get gas to market 

6 while externalizing the huge environmental 

7 impacts and avoiding liability. 

8 Currently there's four proposed natural 

9 gas pipelines in Virginia that would create 

10 almost 2,000 miles of new pipeline infrastructure 

11 over a dozen -- and over a dozen compressor 

12 stations. We, and Virginians everywhere, are 

13 concerned for the impacts these pipelines will 

14 have across the Commonwealth, not the least of 

15 which is carbon air pollution from the resulting 

16 methane leakage and end use burning of a huge 

17 supply of natural gas. 

18 I am one of literally thousands of land 

19 owners currently facing the prospect of imminent 

20 domain proceedings and a 42-inch high compression 

21 pipeline on my property only a stone's throw away 

22 from my house. 
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1 But Virginia is just the tip of the 

2 iceberg. Industry reports document no less than 

3 17 pipeline projects meant to ship about 17.3 

4 billion cubic feet per day of natural gas out of 

5 Pennsylvania, West Virginia, and Ohio to end 

6 users. The EPA should not allow the Clean Power 

7 Plan to be used as justification for this, the 

8 largest taking of private land rights in our 

9 lifetime. In reality the vast majority of this 

10 gas will be exported, profiting the natural gas 

11 industry and passing the infrastructure costs to 

12 ratepayers. 

13 Similarly, the EPA can choose to not 

14 allow the Clean Power Plan to be used as 

15 justification for burning Virginia's forests in 

16 biomass incinerator generators. All this is 

17 being done with the promise of cleaner air and 

18 reductions in greenhouse gas emissions. Nothing 

19 could be farther from the truth. 

20 Biomass burning for energy generation 

21 releases more particulates -- more particulates 

22 and carbon per unit of energy generated than any 
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1 fossil fuel source. This is particularly 

2 problematic in low income communities where these 

3 facilities reside. 

4 Methane releases are dramatically 

5 problematic as methane is an 86 times stronger 

6 heat-trapping gas than carbon dioxide over 20 

7 years. And researchers find that assuming a 

8 conservative methane leakage rate of 1.5 percent 

9 and using full life cycle analysis, this volume 

10 will both increase net carbon emissions and slow 

11 the process of de-carbonization primarily by 

12 delaying deployment of renewable energy 

13 technologies. 

14 As you know, even with the best 

15 intentions of the EPA Clean Power Plan the U.S. 

16 has no comprehensive national energy policy that 

17 relates to this huge build out of carbon fuel 

18 infrastructure; and no analysis of its total 

19 impacts on air quality and carbon emissions. 

20 In Virginia we have been advocating for a 

21 comprehensive NEPA compliant programmatic 

22 environmental impact statement that would analyze 
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1 the domestic need for this proposed 

2 infrastructure and for the gas that all of these 

3 proposed pipelines would carry, full life cycle 

4 carbon impacts from the proposed infrastructure, 

5 including extraction, storage, transportation, 

6 combustion and liquefication for export, and the 

7 relative costs and benefits of other relative 

8 energy alternatives. 

9 This PEIS would be important for the 

10 present and for the future. It would provide the 

11 basis for a rational common sense and vital 

12 energy policy that we currently lack. The EPA 

13 could and should advocate for this PEIS as part 

14 of the Clean Power Plan. 

15 In conclusion, we need a Clean Power Plan 

16 that doesn't incentivize dangerous and 

17 unnecessary new gas pipeline infrastructure. We 

18 need a Clean Power Plan that considers full life 

19 cycle accounting of any fuel source. We need a 

20 Clean Power Plan that does not clear cut our 

21 forests for fuel or for duplicative pipeline 

22 corridors. We need a Clean Power Plan that does 
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1 not inequitably impact communities where the 

2 emissions are most concentrated. We need a Clean 

3 Power Plan that recognizes that natural gas like 

4 biomass generation is a false solution. We need 

5 a Clean Power Plan that rewards large-scale 

6 energy efficiency and community-scale renewable 

7 technologies. And finally, we need a Clean Power 

8 Plan that keeps our forests and our communities 

9 standing strong against climate change. Thank 

10 you. 

11 MR. HARVEY: Thank you. Questions? 

12 Ms. Burchfield, if you could start by 

13 spelling your name? 

14 MS. BURCHFIEL: Linda Burchfiel, 

15 L-I-N-D-A, B-U-R-C-H-F-I-E-L. 

16 MS JONES: Ask if you could pull the mike 

17 a little closer? 

18 MS. BURCHFIEL: Oh, closer? Okay. 

19 MR. HARVEY: Yes, just move -- move the 

20 whole stand closer to you. Thank you. 

21 MS. BURCHFIEL: All right. Okay. First, 

22 I want to thank the EPA for its hard work in 
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1 crafting the Clean Power Plan with its goal of 

2 reducing carbon emissions from the power sector 

3 32 percent from 2005 levels by 2030. Climate 

4 change is a global problem that calls for action 

5 now; and we can't wait. 

6 I see the effects of climate change most 

7 clearly when I go once a month to see my mother 

8 in Norfolk. You're going to hear a lot about 

9 Norfolk because we, Virginians -- it's really 

10 scary. It's right there. It's our state. 

11 She lives in an assisted living program 

12 on Granby Street in the heart of the city, and I 

13 don't even to go -- bother to go down if rain is 

14 forecast. Sea level rise is a huge problem there 

15 affecting the daily lives of everyone. Even 

16 moderate rainfall leads to flooding in low lying 

17 areas, and Granby Street has already been raised 

18 at the outskirts of the city. Other streets 

19 remain vulnerable to sea level rise, and many 

20 residents are not able to drive when it rains. 

21 And my mother's assisted living home staff is 

22 sometimes not able to make it to work. 
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1 The Climate Change and Sea Level Rise 

2 Initiative Program at Old Dominion University 

3 projects that by 2040 Hampton Boulevard, the main 

4 road to the naval base, will be impassable every 

5 day for two to three hours at high tide. 

6 Norfolk politicians have faced the 

7 problem, hired experts from the Netherlands to 

8 study it; and they suggested a solution of flood 

9 gates and higher roads to manage the sea level 

10 rise. It might work, but it will cost a billion 

11 dollars, and the funds are not available. 

12 Every state has suffered from climate 

13 change whether it's been wild fires, extreme 

14 temperatures, lost crops, or flooding; and as 

15 impacts grow, the costs will only rise. These 

16 costs have already taken an enormous toll, yet 

17 some governors claim that the cost to address 

18 climate change or the Clean Power Plan is too 

19 high. They do not see the economic potential of 

20 developing renewable energy resources especially 

21 the cheapest source of all -- energy efficiency. 

22 Energy efficiency creates local jobs 
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1 ranging from architects, to electricians, to 

2 installation installers. These governors are 

3 suing the EPA and may not provide a state 

4 implementation plan; however, the Yale Project on 

5 Climate Change Communication released just last 

6 week shows that in 22 of the 26 states doing the 

7 EPA, the governors are obviously out of touch 

8 because the majority of their constituents in 

9 those states -- the majority supports setting 

10 strict limits on coal fire power plants. 

11 Non compliant states must not undercut 

12 the carbon reduction goal of the Clean Power 

13 Plan. I urge you to develop federal 

14 implementation plans that maintain the targets 

15 for each state, limit pollution allowances, cover 

16 carbon pollution from new power plants as well as 

17 existing ones. In addition, energy efficiency, 

18 which generates the cheapest form of electricity 

19 must be incentivized. This helps ease the 

20 transition for all consumers and is especially 

21 important for low income, minority, and 

22 indigenous consumers many of whom have been 
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1 living in the shadow of fossil fuel plants, have 

2 suffered asthma and higher risk of cancer and 

3 other diseases. 

4 EPA has developed a Clean Power Plan 

5 providing the states with achievable targets, a 

6 lot of flexibility in developing implementation 

7 plans, and EPA expertise and guidance in 

8 developing plans. 

9 As a result, most residents, most 

10 utilities, and most governors are willing to 

11 comply. Those who do not comply and do not 

12 develop an acceptable implementation plan must be 

13 provided a federal plan that produces the carbon 

14 reduction levels in the final plan and protects 

15 low income and minority citizens. 

16 Thank you for this opportunity to speak 

17 in support of Federal Implementation Plans that 

18 achieve the carbon pollution reduction goal set 

19 in the Final Plan. Thank you. 

20 MR. HARVEY: Thank you, Ms. Burchfield, 

21 and thank you for coming up here from Hampton. 

22 Do we have question? No? Okay. Thank 
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1 you both. 

2 Our next speakers -- I'm not sure I'm 

3 going to say the name correctly -- Dan Mislen and 

4 Elizabeth Perera. 

5 So if I could ask you to start by 

6 spelling your name 

7 MR. MISLEH: M-I-S-L-E-H, first name 

8 Daniel. 

9 MR. HARVEY: L-E-H. Ready when you are. 

10 MR. MISLEH: Ready. Thank you for this 

11 opportunity to offer some reflections about the 

12 Federal Plan for the Environmental Protection 

13 Agency's Clean Power Plan. 

14 My name is Dan Misleh. I am the 

15 Executive Director of Catholic Climate Covenant, 

16 a coalition of 14 national Catholic 

17 organizations, including the U.S. Conference of 

18 Catholic Bishops and other prominent national 

19 Catholic groups. Together we work to share 

20 Catholic teaching on the environment and motivate 

21 Catholic action. 

22 In doing so we lift up not only the care 
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1 of planet Earth but also the demands of the poor 

2 in a world threatened by climate change. It is 

3 on behalf of these partners that I offer these 

4 reflections about how best to proceed in a 

5 climate threatened world and to highlight the 

6 role of government whose primary responsibility 

7 is to promote the common good of all, not just 

8 the interest of a few. 

9 As a Catholic, I could not be prouder of 

10 Pope Francis, our Catholic bishops, and our many 

11 partners for their leadership on environmental 

12 questions. It may be a helpful reminder that the 

13 Catholic community has been engaged in these 

14 issues of environmental protection for decades. 

15 The whole body of U.S. bishops first spoke about 

16 the environment in 1991 in Renewing the Earth. 

17 That was followed by one of the first religious 

18 body statements specifically on climate change in 

19 2001. And we all know that communities of 

20 religious women have been working to protect 

21 creation and people in poverty for decades. 

22 It should not be a surprise to anyone 
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1 that Pope Francis would make the environment a 

2 hallmark of his papacy. His choice of the name 

3 Francis after the patron saint of those who 

4 promote ecology was an obvious clue. And the 

5 world is a far better place for his witness and 

6 this teaching. 

7 In the Judeo-Christian tradition our 

8 concern for work -- our concern for and work on 

9 the environment predates the modern environmental 

10 movement by over three and a half millennia. We 

11 go back to Genesis, not just Earth Day. But we 

12 will also admit that we have not always lived up 

13 to this teaching. That is changing. Thank God. 

14 With his ecological encyclical, Laudato 

15 Si, Pope Francis calls all of humanity to enter 

16 into a serious and sustained dialog about the 

17 future of our common home. He reminds how we 

18 treat the environment is a reflection of how we 

19 treat ourselves and vice versa. If we destroy 

20 our common home, we bring untold suffering to 

21 ourselves and our brothers and sisters at home 

22 and abroad. It is the responsibility of all 
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1 people and all institutions, especially 

2 government, to provide frameworks, incentives, 

3 and programs to protect creation and care for the 

4 most vulnerable. 

5 Recognizing that this time -- recognizing 

6 that time is increasingly short to deal with the 

7 climate question, Pope Francis said in Laudato 

8 Si, reducing greenhouse gases requires honesty, 

9 courage, and responsibility above all on the part 

10 of those countries which are more powerful and 

11 pollute the most. 

12 Turning to these new federal rules and 

13 limiting carbon pollution on August 3rd, the day 

14 that EPA announced its final rule, Archbishop 

15 Wenski, Chairman of the U.S. Bishops Committee on 

16 Domestic Justice and Human Development, said, a 

17 new standard -- a new national standard to reduce 

18 carbon pollution from existing power plants is an 

19 important step forward to protect the health of 

20 all people, especially children, the elderly, and 

21 poor in vulnerable communities from harmful 

22 pollution and the impacts of climate change. 
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1 It might be helpful (clears throat) -- 

2 excuse me. It might be helpful to reflect on the 

3 Catholic social teaching principle of 

4 subsidiarity [sic] which says that issues facing 

5 society should be resolved at the lowest level 

6 possible, but higher levels of authority should 

7 be invoked when lower levels cannot resolve 

8 issues. The U.S. Bishops have agreed that a 

9 national standard to reduce emissions is needed. 

10 But it would also be consistent with subsidiarity 

11 to encourage states to decide on how best to meet 

12 these national standards. So it seemed to be far 

13 more effective for states to take full advantage 

14 of the flexibility of the rules at the state 

15 level and not have the Federal Rule imposed upon 

16 them. 

17 For myself and our partners, the Federal 

18 guidelines outlined in this rule appear to be 

19 reasonable, but we have a preference for state 

20 implementation. Nevertheless, we must all move 

21 forward as a nation to implement reductions in 

22 greenhouse gas pollution. 
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1 These rules also form a vital platform 

2 upon which U.S. negotiators can stand as they 

3 head to Paris for the upcoming International 

4 Climate Change Talks. 

5 To conclude, the primary obligation of 

6 government is to promote the common good and 

7 protect its citizens, especially the most 

8 vulnerable. Courageous and determined action to 

9 reduce dangerous anthropogenic climate change 

10 will certainly help meet this obligation. Thank 

11 you. 

12 MR. HARVEY: Thank you, Mr. Misleh. 

13 Okay. We'll have Ms. Perera. Please 

14 start by spelling your name. 

15 MS. PERERA: Name is Liz, Elizabeth 

16 Perera, P-E-R-E-R-A. 

17 Hi, my name is Elizabeth Perera. I am a 

18 Climate Policy Director with the Sierra Club, and 

19 I'm from Bethesda, Maryland. I'm also a mother 

20 of two children, one seven and one five. And it 

21 is our obligation to ensure this planet can 

22 support long life for all of our children. I 
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1 strongly support EPA's Clean Power Plan and the 

2 Proposed Federal Implementation Plan. And I urge 

3 EPA to finalize a strong and just federal 

4 implementation plan. 

5 The fact that EPA can enforce a federal 

6 plan if a state fails to act is a critical safety 

7 net that has been protecting public health and 

8 states since the Clean Air Act was signed into 

9 law decades ago. The Clean Air Act directs the 

10 Environmental Protection Agency to set national 

11 clean air standards, and in this case, standards 

12 for carbon pollution from our nation's existing 

13 fossil fuel fired power plants. The law gives 

14 the states the first shot at developing and 

15 implementing these standards in their 

16 jurisdictions by writing state-specific pollution 

17 control plans tailored to local conditions. 

18 The Clean Power Plan gives states a lot 

19 of flexibility to decide the appropriate emission 

20 reduction measures to meet the standard. 

21 Therefore, there is every reason for a state to 

22 develop its own plan that takes into account its 
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1 own circumstances. And most states in the past 

2 choose to develop their own plan based on that 

3 knowledge. 

4 If a state fails to adopt and implement 

5 an adequate plan, EPA must issue and enforce a 

6 Federal Implementation Plan. In order to ensure 

7 that the draft model federal plan is strong and 

8 just, EPA must do the following: Number 1, 

9 ensure the carbon pollution standards in the 

10 Model Federal Plan achieve pollution reductions 

11 promised in the Final Clean Power Plan. 

12 Number 2, ensure that states address 

13 potential carbon pollution from new power plants 

14 to achieve overall electric sector reductions in 

15 carbon pollution. They should also address 

16 sources of carbon pollution from other plants 

17 such as biomass plants and discourage natural gas 

18 usage. 

19 Number 3, protect low income consumers by 

20 maximizing utilities' incentives to invest in 

21 energy efficiency which lowers household energy 

22 bills and lowers the energy bills of large 
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1 industrial consumers as well. 

2 Number 4, ensure that the Model Federal 

3 Plan protects and benefits minority, low income, 

4 and indigenous communities that have long borne 

5 the brunt of the fossil fuel pollution and may be 

6 most likely to experience the first impacts of 

7 climate change and the most severe impacts of 

8 climate change. 

9 Number 5, resist giveaways of allowances 

10 to the most polluting sources. It is a proven 

11 fact that generators will pass the cost of 

12 compliance on to consumers even if they get the 

13 allowances for free. This is a concern with the 

14 draft Federal Implementation Plan. This money 

15 needs to stay in the public trust and be invested 

16 in energy efficiency and renewable energy and 

17 help the low income and minority communities. It 

18 is not in the public's best interest to give 

19 allowances away for free to generators. 

20 Fossil fuel fired power plants are really 

21 the largest source of greenhouse gases and are 

22 thus the biggest contributor to climate change. 
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1 Climate change is a human rights issue and 

2 communities across the globe are dealing with the 

3 devastating impacts from families displaced from 

4 their homes due to extreme weather events to our 

5 children suffering from health impacts of poor 

6 air quality. By regulating these plants, the 

7 Clean Power Plan will lead to significant climate 

8 and public health benefits for all. 

9 The Clean Power Plan will clean up our 

10 air and address climate disruption, and it will 

11 also modernize our country and spur economic 

12 growth and innovation which will create thousands 

13 of jobs and bring billions of dollars and new 

14 investments to our country. Thank you. 

15 MR. HARVEY: Thank you, Ms. Perera. 

16 Questions? No. Okay. Thank you both. 

17 (Discussion off the record.) 

18 MR. HARVEY: All right. So we're -- 

19 we're going to break at noon. We're going to get 

20 to as many speakers as we can before then, but we 

21 still have more speakers who have signed up. 

22 We're clearly not going to get to all of them by 
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1 noon. So please work with us, and we can try to 

2 work you in after -- after the noon break. 

3 So let's now move to Chad Oba and Nicole 

4 Holstein. 

5 I'm not sure who Chad Oba is, so whoever 

6 -- are either one of you? Are you Chad? 

7 MS. OBA: Yes, yes. 

8 MR. HARVEY: Okay. Great. Could you -- 

9 could you start by spelling your name, and then 

10 we'll start the timer. 

11 MS. OBA: Okay. My name is Chad Oba, 

12 last name O-B-A. 

13 MR. HARVEY: Ready. 

14 MS. OBA: I live in Buckingham County, 

15 Virginia, where I'm a Chair of a citizen's group 

16 called Friends of Buckingham. I'm here today 

17 with Friends of Buckingham, Virginia Organizing, 

18 and National People's Action. I'm here to 

19 encourage a more robust Clean Power Plan that 

20 protects communities like mine from devastation 

21 by the fossil fuel industry. 

22 The Atlantic Coast Pipeline, LLC, has 
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1 submitted a permit application to the Virginia 

2 Department of Environmental Quality to construct 

3 and operate a compressor station at Woods Corner 

4 in Buckingham County. This locality is less than 

5 one mile from my home and the homes of many 

6 others, especially elderly -- there's a large 

7 population of elderly in my area, and they are 

8 especially vulnerable to this compressor station 

9 and its emissions. 

10 The effects of the project run in 

11 complete opposition to the moral imperative of 

12 our time. We need to stop the rape of our land, 

13 be good caretakers of each other and of our home 

14 planet, and reverse climate change now. 

15 If constructed, the Buckingham compressor 

16 station would have four natural gas powered 

17 turbines. Once it gets up and running, this 

18 station is expected to spew 585 million pounds a 

19 year of hazardous pollutants, including methane, 

20 carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxides, sulfur dioxide, 

21 volatile organic compounds, particulate matter, 

22 and hazardous air pollutants such as formaldehyde 
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1 into our community's air. These are the low 

2 estimates. 

3 Natural gas compressor stations are among 

4 the most polluting kinds of energy 

5 infrastructure. In a recent study more than 40 

6 percent of air samples from compressor stations 

7 exceeded federal regulations for certain 

8 chemicals like methane, benzene, and hydrogen 

9 sulfide. 

10 The proposed Buckingham compressor 

11 station would emit nearly two tons of 

12 formaldehyde into our air every year. 

13 Formaldehyde causes nausea, headaches, and 

14 difficulty breathing and can also cause or 

15 aggravate asthma. 

16 What manner of intelligence allows our 

17 health and safety to be sacrificed in the name of 

18 corporate profits? If the Clean Power Plan is to 

19 succeed in improving air quality in communities 

20 like mine, it must not prioritize the increased 

21 utilization of natural gas which will encourage 

22 the construction of more of these monstrous 
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1 compressor stations at the expense of public 

2 health. The Clean Power Plan and Federal 

3 Implementation Plan should instead concentrate on 

4 expanding access to real renewables like wind and 

5 solar that do not contribute to air pollution in 

6 vulnerable communities. The Clean Power Plan 

7 must also include a programmatic environmental 

8 impact statement that addresses the cumulative 

9 impacts of all oil and gas pipelines and their 

10 infrastructures regionally, nationally, and 

11 compare that to the impacts of renewable energy 

12 sources. 

13 The Clean Power Plan currently fails to 

14 appropriately evaluate the risks posed by methane 

15 emissions from compression stations and other 

16 natural gas processing infrastructure. In 

17 particular, we object strongly to the EPA's 

18 methods of assessing the global warming potential 

19 of methane emissions. 

20 Currently the Clean Power Plan uses 100-

21 year global warming potential which calculates 

22 methane to be 25 times stronger than CO2 as a 
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1 heat-trapping gas. The CPP must adopt the more 

2 meaningful 20-year GWP of methane which figures 

3 it to be a whopping 86 times stronger a heat4 trapping gas than CO2 over a 20-year time scale. 

5 The discrepancy in evaluation methods is 

6 highly disturbing. As the 20-year GWP tells us, 

7 there is a much greater and, therefore, graver 

8 toxicity output from this industry than you, the 

9 EPA, understands, and, therefore, we are all 

10 subject to. 

11 We urgently ask you to adopt the 

12 evaluation standard of a 20-year GWP now. We 

13 applaud the Clean Power Plan, and we urge the EPA 

14 to do more to ensure that sensitive populations 

15 like the population of Buckingham County are 

16 protected from the impact of dirty energy 

17 infrastructure and carbon pollution. 

18 Underneath sensitive populations need to 

19 be considered when citing compressor stations. 

20 Well, we -- all of us here in Buckingham are a 

21 sensitive population. Our lives are as valuable 

22 as anyone else's and they need to be put before 
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1 the natural gas industry's bottom line. Thank 

2 you. 

3 MR. HARVEY: Thank you for coming to join 

4 us from Buckingham County. Thank you. 

5 We will now turn to Nicole Holstein. If 

6 you'll start by spelling your name. 

7 MS. HOLSTEIN: Yes. N-I-C-O-L-E, 

8 H-O-L-S-T-E-I-N. And I'm with the National 

9 Wildlife Federation. 

10 Thank you for the opportunity to submit 

11 formal testimony regarding EPA's Proposed Clean 

12 Power Plan. My name is Nicole Holstein, and I am 

13 a native West Virginian. In fact, my family has 

14 lived in the hills of West Virginia as long as 

15 the state has existed. I am here today as a 

16 seventh generation West Virginian to express my 

17 strong support for the EPA's historic action to 

18 combat climate change while setting limits on 

19 carbon pollution from existing power plants. 

20 A life surrounded by the Appalachian 

21 Mountains and the plants and wildlife that make 

22 it so wonderful imbued me with a lifelong love 
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1 for Appalachia and a sense of responsibility to 

2 protect the places I love. That's why I'm 

3 pursuing a terminal degree in ecology because the 

4 unique ecosystems of Appalachia are under serious 

5 threat, especially from climate change and one of 

6 its main drivers, emissions from the burning of 

7 fossil fuels. 

8 The cruel irony of these ecosystems, and 

9 wildlife, and people that inhabit them being 

10 threatened by the very substances lying from 

11 beneath them is not lost on you, I'm sure. 

12 Did you know that the Appalachian 

13 mountain range is one of the most bio diverse 

14 terrestrial systems in the world? In fact, we're 

15 number one in the world in terms of salamander 

16 diversity, but that diversity is threatened by 

17 climate change and coal mining. 

18 I am witness to the impact of fossil 

19 fuels and the poverty of the Appalachian coal 

20 fields, the respiratory disease, and cancer 

21 epidemics among children and adults in coal 

22 producing communities and the virtual 
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1 disappearance of wildlife from certain areas. I 

2 have stood upon Kayford Mountain and listened to 

3 the complete silence -- not a single bird song. 

4 I have swiped my finger through the thick coal 

5 dust that settles on property in the course of a 

6 single day. 

7 We have an obligation to protect our 

8 children and future generations from the impacts 

9 of climate change. And we also have an 

10 obligation to protect wildlife and our natural 

11 resources upon which we all depend that are on 

12 the frontlines of our changing climate. 

13 Our warming climate is posing one of the 

14 greatest threats today. And as an Appalachian 

15 native, and nature lover, and a student of 

16 science, I applaud EPA for taking action to 

17 combat the root of the problem -- carbon 

18 pollution. 

19 The U.S. EPA's Clean Power Plan is a 

20 major step in the right direction. This plan 

21 will help speed the way towards a future in which 

22 we invest more in clean energy and less in fuels 
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1 that pollute our air, and water, and harm our 

2 global climate. By reducing reliance on coal 

3 burning for power generation in the United 

4 States, the Clean Power Plan will help protect 

5 ecosystems and people by reducing not only carbon 

6 pollution but other harmful pollutants like 

7 mercury that poison fish and threaten all those 

8 who eat them. The Clean Power Plan will reduce 

9 the need for more coal mining that's destroying 

10 precious habitat and strangling my people. And 

11 it will reduce the number of leaking toxic coal 

12 waste ponds that put our waterways in harm's way. 

13 My home state is one of those currently 

14 launching attacks against the Clean Power Plan, 

15 but I applaud it. The power of the coal lobby is 

16 strong in Appalachia, but the right thing to do 

17 is to protect our people, our wildlife, and our 

18 beautiful natural species from the negative 

19 impacts of fossil fuels. 

20 While I hope that my home state of West 

21 Virginia will step up and create their own plan 

22 to reach the goals set forth by the Clean Power 
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1 Plan, I commend the EPA for creating this 

2 backstop federal guaranty for reducing carbon 

3 pollution and protecting wildlife. The federal 

4 plan should be strong and aimed at protecting 

5 people and wildlife from power plant carbon 

6 pollution in order to ensure proper pollution 

7 reduction and to encourage renewable energy 

8 solutions. 

9 The proposed plan should be finalize in a 

10 timely manner so that states have time to use it 

11 to guide the formulation of their own plans. 

12 Thank you for the opportunity to comment 

13 today, and we look forward to working with you to 

14 finalize and implement the Clean Power Plan. We 

15 hope you will do everything you can to ensure it 

16 stays strong throughout the process. Wildlife 

17 and the people of Appalachia are counting on your 

18 leadership. Thank you. 

19 MR. HARVEY: Thank you, Ms. Holstein -- 

20 appreciate your testimony. 

21 With that we've now reached noon, so we 

22 will -- we will halt and resume for our afternoon 
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1 session after our break. Thank you. 

2 MR. CLOUSE: So the resumption of the 

3 public hearing will be at 1:00 o'clock. 

4 (Brief recess.) 

5 

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1 A F T E R N O O N S E S S I O N 

2 MS. DUNHAM: Okay. I think I'm on. We 

3 will get started here this afternoon. Just make 

4 sure our court reporter is ready to do. Okay. 

5 Thank you all. 

6 So, good afternoon, my name is Sarah 

7 Dunham, and I am the Chair of today's public 

8 hearing. Thank you for coming today. 

9 Joining me on the panel today are Julia 

10 Miller and Elyse Steiner. 

11 Fossil fuel fired power plants are the 

12 largest source of U.S. carbon dioxide emissions 

13 or carbon pollution, accounting for 31 percent of 

14 U.S. total greenhouse gas emissions. Reducing 

15 carbon pollution from power plants is an 

16 essential step in lessening the impacts of 

17 climate change and providing a more certain 

18 future for our environment, our health, and 

19 future generations. 

20 We are here today to listen to your 

21 comments on the EPA's Proposed Federal Plan and 

22 Model Rule to implement the Clean Power Plan for 
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1 existing power plants. 

2 On October 23rd, 2015, the Environmental 

3 Protection Agency published in the Federal 

4 Register its proposed Federal Plan to implement 

5 emission guidelines for power plants under 

6 Section 111(d) of the Clean Air Act. The EPA's 

7 111(d) rule known as the Clean Power Plan takes 

8 effect on December 22nd, 2015, and applies to 

9 affected power plants that began construction on 

10 or before January 8th, 2014. 

11 The Federal Plan and Model Trading Rules 

12 demonstrate a readily available path forward for 

13 Clean Power Plan implementation and present 

14 flexible, affordable implementation options for 

15 states. The Model Rules provide a cost effective 

16 pathway to adopt a trading system supported by 

17 EPA and make it easy for states and power plants 

18 to use emissions trading. It does the heavy 

19 lifting for states who may choose to use a Model 

20 Rule as their state plan. The EPA would 

21 implement the Federal Plan in any state that does 

22 not submit an approvable plan. 
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1 This proposal includes four discreet 

2 proposed actions: A rate-based federal plan for 

3 each state with affected EGUs; a mass-based 

4 federal plan for each state with affected EGUs; a 

5 rate-based model trading rule for potential use 

6 by any state; and a mass-based model trading rule 

7 for potential use by any state. 

8 The Proposed Federal Plans will achieve 

9 the same level of emissions performance as 

10 required of state plans under the Clean Power 

11 Plan. Federal plans will be finalized only for 

12 those states with affected EGUs that the EPA 

13 determines have failed to submit an approvable 

14 111(d) State Plan by the relevant deadlines set 

15 in the Emission Guidelines. 

16 In those states where a federal plan may 

17 be required, a final federal plan will implement 

18 the same emission guidelines for affected power 

19 plants outlined in the Clean Power Plan. It 

20 would not require additional control requirements 

21 or impose additional costs. 

22 Even where a federal plan is in place for 
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1 a particular state, that state will still be able 

2 to submit a plan which, if approved, will allow 

3 the state and its sources to exit the federal 

4 plan. States may take delegation of 

5 administrative aspects of the federal plan in 

6 order to become the primary implementers or 

7 submit partial state plans in order to take over 

8 the implementation of a portion of a federal 

9 plan. 

10 States operating under a federal plan may 

11 adopt complementary measures outside of that plan 

12 to facilitate compliance and lower costs to the 

13 benefit of power generators and consumers. 

14 The proposal also includes as a Model 

15 Rule for those states that are developing their 

16 own state plans. The EPA intends to finalize 

17 both the rate-based and mass-based model trading 

18 rules in the summer of 2016. A state program 

19 that adheres to the model trading rule provisions 

20 specified in this rulemaking, when final, would 

21 be presumptively approvable. 

22 There are standalone portions of the 
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1 model trading rule such as the evaluation, 

2 measurement, and verification procedures for 

3 emission rate credits, ERCs, that would be 

4 approvable even if a state adopted an approach 

5 that differs in other respects from the Model 

6 Rule. 

7 In addition, the proposal contains a 

8 finding that it is necessary or appropriate to 

9 implement a Section 111(d) federal plan for the 

10 affected EGUs located in Indian Country. Carbon 

11 dioxide emission performance rates for these 

12 facilities were finalized in the Clean Power 

13 Plan. 

14 Information on how the EPA will reach out 

15 to communities throughout the comment period and 

16 an overview of the actions that the EPA is taking 

17 to ensure that vulnerable communities are not 

18 being disproportionately impacted by this 

19 rulemaking. 

20 If you would like more details on the 

21 proposed rule, there are fact sheets available at 

22 the registration desk. 
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1 Before we get started, I'd like to go 

2 through a few housekeeping items and ground rules 

3 that will make today's hearing run smoothly. 

4 First, please be sure you have checked in 

5 at the registration desk even if you are not 

6 planning to speak today. And if you signed up to 

7 speak online or by phone but haven't told us yet 

8 that you're here, please step out to the 

9 registration desk and let the EPA staff know that 

10 you have arrived. 

11 I will call speakers up in pairs. When 

12 your name is called, please come to the speakers' 

13 table at the front of the room. When I call on 

14 you to speak, please state your name and spell it 

15 for the court reporter. Your comments will be 

16 transcribed and included in the record of 

17 comments on the proposed rule. 

18 Each speaker will have five minutes to 

19 give comments. We have a timer light to help you 

20 know how much time you have left to speak. If 

21 you have an extra copy of your statement, please 

22 provide it to the court reporter as well. When 
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1 the light turns from green to yellow, that means 

2 you have one minute remaining. When it turns 

3 red, that's a signal that you're at five minutes, 

4 and it is time to stop. 

5 When you are finished speaking, please 

6 remain at the table until the person next to you 

7 has also completed his or her testimony. 

8 We are here to listen to you today, 

9 however, a panel member may ask questions to 

10 clarify your comments. I will then call up the 

11 next pair of speakers and so on. 

12 If you have brought a written copy of 

13 your testimony, please give that to the s staff 

14 at the registration desk before you leave today. 

15 We will put any written comments 

16 submitted today in the official docket for the 

17 proposed rule. We also have comment cards 

18 available at the registration desk if you would 

19 like to submit additional written comments today. 

20 If you want to comment in writing later, 

21 stop by the materials table near the registration 

22 desk and pick up a copy of the instructions for 
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1 submitting written comments. Comments must be 

2 received by January 21, 2016. 

3 Let me assure you the EPA gives as much 

4 consideration to comments that we receive in 

5 writing as we do to comments we receive at public 

6 hearings like this one. So if you have more 

7 comments you would like to provide the EPA, 

8 please submit them by the comment period 

9 deadline. Your comments will be reviewed. 

10 If you have any questions during the day, 

11 please see the staff at the registration desk, 

12 and someone will assist you. 

13 Thank you again for taking the time today 

14 to share your comments on the EPA's proposal. So 

15 let's get started. 

16 I will call up the first two folks I have 

17 on my cards here. And if you could both come up 

18 and take a seat, that would be great. 

19 So the first two folks I have are Joe 

20 Cook and Vernon Savage. 

21 (Pause.) 

22 Great. And so we'll start with Mr. Cook 
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1 when you're ready. 

2 MR. COOK: My name is Joe Cook. That's 

3 J-O-E, C-O-O-K. I am from Norfolk, Virginia, 

4 which is at ground zero for sea level rise and 

5 climate change, second only to New Orleans for an 

6 at-risk-metropolitan area. 

7 I am the chairperson of the Chesapeake 

8 Bay Group of the Virginia Sierra Club. Thank you 

9 for this opportunity to once again come and 

10 address you as I have at all of the hearings 

11 related to the Clean Power Plan and to comment in 

12 support of the EPA's long overdue plan and the 

13 recently proposed Federal Implementation Plan. 

14 As someone who owns a home near the 

15 Lafayette River in Norfolk, I regularly 

16 experience flooding on the streets in front of my 

17 house and in all flood prone areas throughout the 

18 city even when there is a heavy rainfall. Twice 

19 during nor'easters in 2009 and 2011 the flood 

20 water reached under my house and near the bottom 

21 of my floor. 

22 Fortunately, we have not recently had a 
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1 direct hit from a hurricane during my time there; 

2 but the thought of such things brings fear of the 

3 loss of my house. Therefore, I am acutely aware 

4 of the affects of CO2 emissions on climate 

5 change, sea level rising, and recurrent flooding 

6 in severe weather events on coastal Virginia and 

7 the rest of the country near the water. 

8 And as for fear related to climate 

9 change, I am much more fearful of that than the 

10 impact on my way of life and others than ISIS or 

11 any other foreign terrorists. 

12 As you know, fossil fuel -- fossil fuel 

13 fired power plants is the largest source of 

14 greenhouse gases -- 40 percent of the CO2 and are 

15 a major contributor to climate change as well as 

16 respiratory and heart diseases. But by 2030 the 

17 Clean Power Plan, which I advocated for stronger 

18 standards -- but even if that is implemented and 

19 enforced as intended it's predicted, as you know, 

20 to prevent 150,000 asthma attacks and up to 6,000 

21 premature deaths annually. 

22 In Norfolk we suffer not only from coal 
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1 plant emissions but also from the annual release 

2 of 90,000 pounds of coal dust from Norfolk 

3 Southern's Lamberts Point Coal Terminal, the 

4 largest in North America, which, unfortunately, 

5 was given a grandfather exemption from the Clean 

6 Air Act which I find irrational and a threat to 

7 public and environmental health. 

8 Along with the health benefits, the CPP 

9 tackles climate change, the defining issue of our 

10 time, head on. Just think about the savings 

11 accruing from preventing catastrophic property 

12 damage and economic disruption while enhancing 

13 our national security, both internal and 

14 external. 

15 Secretary of State John Kerry just came 

16 down last week to Norfolk and talked about the 

17 latter in relation to the emergency need to 

18 address the climate change and protect military 

19 assets there in Norfolk and around the world. 

20 If we don't act quickly to stop 

21 increasing CO2 emissions already at a chronic 

22 level of 400 parts per million and start 
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1 reversing it, he said it could lead to 

2 displacement of huge populations here and abroad, 

3 social unrest that could lead to wars over food 

4 and water in foreign countries and millions more 

5 refugees. 

6 At the same time the CPP provides great 

7 opportunity for economic growth and sustainable 

8 development. Investing in clean energy can 

9 create millions of jobs -- three times as many as 

10 fossil fuels -- and stimulate robust growth in 

11 our country. As you know, the EPA estimates the 

12 CPP will deliver 93 billion in savings and 

13 benefits by 2030. 

14 Climate change is the moral imperative of 

15 our time and a human rights issue as stated by a 

16 number of people, including Pope Francis. 

17 Communities across the globe are already dealing 

18 with this devastating impact from families 

19 displaced from their homes due to extreme weather 

20 to our children suffering from the health impacts 

21 of poor air quality. You tack all the issues in 

22 a broad and in depth way, the EPA has to make 
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1 sure the draft model federal plan is strong and 

2 just. 

3 I ask the EPA to refuse to give -- to 

4 give away allowances to the most polluting 

5 sources as has been done in the past by allowing 

6 states to grandfather in industries like coal 

7 plants that poison the environment and compromise 

8 public health. 

9 And finally, to make sure that the 

10 states' implementation plan is -- is not weak and 

11 lax as it has been in the past. And if a state 

12 doesn't adopt an adequate plan, the EPA should 

13 step in and enforce an implementation plan. 

14 In summary, the Sierra Club calls on you 

15 to stand like a boulder and resist bending to 

16 political pressure at the state and federal 

17 level. As one prominent politician recently 

18 said, if the environment were a bank, it would 

19 have been saved already -- end of quote. 

20 So, EPA, I call on you to treat Mother 

21 Earth better than a bank because there is no 

22 Planet B to fall back on. 
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1 MS. DUNHAM: Thank you very much, Mr. 

2 Cook. 

3 Do you have any questions? Okay. Mr. 

4 Savage? 

5 MR. SAVAGE: All right. My name is 

6 Vernon Savage, V-E-R-N-O-N, S-A-V-A-G-E. 

7 I'm here today to support the Sierra Club 

8 and a few other organizations like Virginia -- 

9 Virginia Organization. And I'm from Norfolk, 

10 Virginia, and I sees a whole lot of flooding done 

11 and a whole lot of pollution going on and stuff. 

12 I just had to come up to support my area from 

13 Norfolk with the help of the Sierra Club today. 

14 That's pretty much what I have to say. 

15 Thank you. 

16 MS. DUNHAM: Thank you. Appreciate it. 

17 All right. Thanks to both of you. 

18 So next I'd like to have Frances 

19 Crutchfield and Herbert Fitzell. And I'm sorry 

20 if I mispronounced either of those names. 

21 Okay. Ms. Crutchfield, when you're 

22 ready. 
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1 MS. CRUTCHFIELD: My name is Frances 

2 Crutchfield, F-R-A-N-C-E-S, 

3 C-R-U-T-C-H-F-I-E-L-D. 

4 Thank you for this opportunity to speak. 

5 As a Sierra Club volunteer, as a mother, a 

6 stepmother, and a grandmother, thank you for the 

7 Clean Power Plan. I will thank you in a poem, An 

8 Ode to the Clean Power Plan. 

9 To the EPA, crucial institution, this 

10 isn't meant as a revolution and is in no way 

11 persecution. Please give heed to my elocution. 

12 We beg you to work for dissolution of bad air 

13 quality from pollution. For climate disruption's 

14 evolution we must soon find a grand solution such 

15 as wind energy institution or a solar power 

16 substitution, for there can't be any restitution 

17 for damage from power plants' carbon pollution. 

18 The benefits of the Clean Power Plan, better 

19 health for a woman, child, and man, each state 

20 must develop its customized plan to meet 

21 challenges in ways that only it can. Reduced 

22 emissions, the immediate goal, lest less soot and 
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1 smog pollutions from coal. No more need for 

2 criticizers, fewer inhalers and nebulizers, and 

3 the hope that someday everywhere children will be 

4 able to breathe clean air. 

5 Thank you. 

6 MS. DUNHAM: Thank you. Impressive. 

7 All right. Mr. Fitzell. 

8 MR. FITZELL: Thank you. I'm Herbert 

9 Fitzell, H-E-R-B-E-R-T, F-I-T-Z-E-L-L; and I 

10 support the Clean Power Plan. 

11 I've come today to express my support for 

12 the great work done by the EPA. I'm an ordinary 

13 citizen from central Virginia, and it is only in 

14 the last couple of years that I've become 

15 familiar with the mind boggling complexity of the 

16 work you do. It is amazing, especially given the 

17 political roadblocks put up specifically to 

18 undermine the fruits of your labor. 

19 Despite these roadblocks, EPA goes about 

20 its daily business of conducting brilliant 

21 science on climate change which will save 

22 countless lives. This point is underscored by 
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1 the current refugee crisis. 

2 I've come -- I have come to understand 

3 this great research is conducted by individuals 

4 whose work is sometimes unappreciated by those 

5 who do not understand it. Yet you public 

6 servants go about your daily business of serving 

7 us all. The climate crisis presents the greatest 

8 threat life has ever faced. It is my hope that 

9 the voices of fear, greed, and hate will not 

10 drown out the more quiet voices determined to 

11 understand our dilemma and serve the public. 

12 Many in Congress even attempt to attack 

13 the integrity of our public servants, but I’m 

14 certain that George Bernard Shaw got it right 

15 when he said, the liars punishment is not in the 

16 least that he is not believed but that he cannot 

17 believe anyone else. 

18 I want to offer my sincere thanks to all 

19 the individuals at the EPA who so selflessly 

20 serve us all in unrecognized ways. Your work is 

21 not only brilliant but profoundly heroic. You 

22 make me proud to be an American, and I can't 
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1 possibly thank you enough. 

2 MS. DUNHAM: Thank you very much, Mr. 

3 Fitzell. 

4 All right. Thank you -- both of you. 

5 So next up I'd like to invite John Luker 

6 and Marjorie Leach-Parker to the -- up here. Do 

7 we have both? 

8 Great. Let's -- let's start with Mr. 

9 Luker. 

10 MR. LUKER: Okay. My name is John Luker, 

11 J-O-H-N, L-U-K-E-R. And I apologize; my glasses 

12 broke on the way up here so, just instead of 

13 rehashing the arguments from this morning and 

14 this afternoon, I'll try to say some new things. 

15 I don't think anybody -- I'm not sure if 

16 there are still people that believe the earth is 

17 still flat, but as far as I know, the earth is a 

18 ball that spins around in space. And there is no 

19 Planet B unless perhaps your Elon Musk or maybe 

20 some people he wants to send to Mars, this is the 

21 only place we have. 

22 As Joe Cook mentioned, Secretary Kerry 
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1 was in Norfolk last week. He spoke of climate 

2 change as being a national security issue. If we 

3 think Syria's a problem, the refugee crisis, 

4 climate change could potentially magnify that 

5 problem to an unbelievable level by causing -- 

6 making places uninhabitable to live and causing 

7 people to migrate. 

8 Terrorism in Paris is in the news, of 

9 course. And that's going to be exacerbated by 

10 climate change. 

11 The real problem with pollution is the 

12 costs are externalized. Everybody knows that the 

13 -- if I dump my trash outside of the building, 

14 I'd probably get arrested even if I threw a Coke 

15 bottle out, I'd probably get arrested; but 

16 somehow it's legal to dump mercury, arsenic, and 

17 other things from power plants. The fracking -- 

18 the EPA, as far as I know, understand let's -- 

19 they don't have to list the ingredients in the 

20 poison they put in the water. It's a proven fact 

21 that they've poisoned people's water supplies. 

22 And as far as I know, that's legal. 
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1 Other people have mentioned the methane 

2 problem with fracking. I support the Clean Power 

3 Plan. I don't think it goes far enough. I don't 

4 understand why it's legal to dump poison in the 

5 air, in the water. Any other business that's 

6 started today wouldn't be allowed to do that. 

7 So I urge you to go beyond what you have. 

8 Hopefully, the ideal thing would be to make 

9 people pay where power plants and other 

10 industries that pollute -- the mountaintop 

11 removal, destroying streams. The people that 

12 pollute pay and the clean energy people get a REC 

13 or Renewable Energy Credit to help balance out 

14 the damage and keep us going toward a sustainable 

15 future. Thank you. 

16 MS. DUNHAM: Thank you very much. 

17 Ms. Leach-Parker. 

18 MS. LEACH-PARKER: Good afternoon. My 

19 name is Marjorie Leach-Parker, M-A-R-J-O-R-I-E, 

20 L-E-A-C-H -- hyphen -- Parker. 

21 I live in Virginia Beach, and I’m a 

22 volunteer with the Chesapeake Bay Group of the 
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1 Virginia Sierra Club. 

2 I'm here today, not to speak for the 

3 Sierra Club, but to speak for myself, for my 

4 children, my grandchildren, and my great 

5 grandson. 

6 I'm here to support the Clean Power Plan 

7 that you have put forward. I want to thank you 

8 for what you have done so far, and I want to 

9 encourage you to move quicker, if possible. 

10 Don't allow the states to cause delay. 

11 As I understand it, the Clean Power Act 

12 directs the Environmental Protection Agency to 

13 set national clean air standards. In this case 

14 standards for carbon pollution from the nation's 

15 existing fossil fuel power plants. The law gives 

16 the states the first shot at developing and 

17 implementing these standards. I want you to 

18 somehow ensure that as you give these states that 

19 time to implement them, that you don't let them 

20 just use and burn time. 

21 I want to thank you for admitting that 

22 there is climate change. I don't know how many 
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1 times I can say it but we need to move quickly. 

2 Some say that the way that climate change 

3 is working is just the natural order of things; 

4 but climate change is influenced more by human 

5 activity and excess greenhouse gases than any 

6 other thing. Scientists have studied and they've 

7 looked at the solar -- the changes relative to 

8 the sun. And they have found that there's very 

9 little change. 

10 In contrast to the warming that we're 

11 observing that's consistent with what we do 

12 producing carbon dioxide and other heat trapping 

13 gases into the atmosphere. 

14 I'm glad you understand that carbon 

15 dioxide hurts us. Carbon dioxide is necessary 

16 for photosynthesis and other things to happen 

17 naturally, but you can have too much of a good 

18 thing. Thus, we need to do something, and we 

19 need to move quickly. 

20 The emission of carbon dioxide from human 

21 activities have the biggest impact on the earth's 

22 climate than anything else. Plants, oceans, soil 
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1 releases, and -- and -- and other things are done 

2 in quantities that are naturally part of the 

3 cycle. These things go away, but the things that 

4 we put into the air don't go away by themselves. 

5 We need to move quickly. 

6 Some people have said, well, it might be 

7 a little too late to do anything. I want to 

8 thank you for realizing that it's not too late 

9 and that we need to start now. 

10 Climate change is a human right. 

11 Communities across the globe are dealing with 

12 devastating impacts from families displaced from 

13 their homes due to extreme weather events to our 

14 children suffering from health -- the health 

15 impact of air quality. 

16 My great grandson just turned a year old. 

17 I would like for him to have air to breath. It's 

18 not too late. 

19 I have to go on forever, but I won't. I 

20 want -- again, my main -- the main message that I 

21 want to give is to find a way to prevent delays. 

22 I know in some states and some areas people are 
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1 going to do every -- anything they can to make 

2 this process take longer. Please do not allow 

3 that. 

4 As you're going through this, remember 

5 that it doesn't matter about the person's 

6 political affiliation, their race, their gender 

7 -- it doesn't matter. We're all human beings. 

8 We have one planet, and we must save this planet. 

9 Also, I'd like to encourage you to ensure 

10 that the standards in the federal plan are 

11 achieved based on the standards you've set. 

12 Protect the low income consumers by maximizing 

13 utility incentives. And please, please, please 

14 don't allow giveaways or allowances to the most 

15 polluting sources which are these big energy 

16 companies. Thank you. 

17 MS. DUNHAM: Thank you very much. 

18 Next I'd like to invite Jonathan Bean and 

19 Tom Burkett to the table. 

20 Great. So, Mr. Bean, when you are ready. 

21 MR. BEAN: Okay. My name is Jonathan 

22 Bean, J-O-N-A-T-H-A-N, Bean, like the food, 
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1 B-E-A-N. 

2 So, why do I care about the 

3 sustainability of the climate, earth, and the 

4 human society? 

5 I was born into a very different earth 

6 and society than the world of my parents and 

7 their ancestors that they inherited. My 

8 generation -- I'm 25 years old -- it is not in 

9 the same position and we do not share the same 

10 future as the older generations. We inherit a 

11 world that has been consumed unsustainably. It 

12 is as if my parents punched holes in the house 

13 right before they gave it to me. The difference 

14 is that the house is spaceship Earth and cannot 

15 be replaced in the near future. I do not want to 

16 live in a world that does not sustain itself 

17 indefinitely or at least a few hundred years. 

18 I intend to do everything I can to ensure 

19 the healthy and sustained future of earth and 

20 humanity that I am deeply connected to. My ego 

21 died around my teenage years. All that is left 

22 is a collective earth organism. I sort of die in 
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1 consciousness and identity -- a few of the heart 

2 feelings and desires of Gaia. 

3 Gaia theory is the idea that earth acts 

4 like a living organism and Gaia is crying. 

5 Humanity, the brain organ of Gaia, is diseased. 

6 We have Gaia and Gaia has an identity disorder. 

7 She has multiple, conflicting identities and 

8 personalities. 

9 The Clean Power Plan is one treatment for 

10 her self-harming behaviors; and we can do better. 

11 We can continue climate Gaian destruction or we 

12 can accept our disorder and get treatment. We 

13 are at a critical fork in the road that Gaia 

14 travels on. We either plummet into climate 

15 destruction or we take a sustainable course. It 

16 is all a matter of willpower. We are addicted to 

17 self-harming behaviors which is fossil fuel 

18 consumption. Like cigarettes were once thought 

19 to be harmless, so now fossil fuel is now a known 

20 carcinogen to Gaia's climate system. We can be a 

21 pest or a symbionce in cymbiosis with earth. 

22 Many symbionce start out as parasites but evolve 
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1 to more efficient relationships with their hosts 

2 and partners. 

3 Let's choose to be in cymbiosis with the 

4 earth before she targets us as a cancer or 

5 parasite. 

6 I'd like to tell you some -- some other 

7 things that we can do to improve the climate 

8 besides the traditional options. There is -- 

9 there is one solution called the Earth 

10 Symbuyosis. I am the founder and CEO. It is an 

11 ethical consumption like Levett. And what we -- 

12 what it -- what it -- how it helps the world, 

13 the climate, it makes ethical consumption easy 

14 and fun by helping you measure, track, compare, 

15 and reward your sustainable consumption of food 

16 and other products. We need help to get this -- 

17 just to get this going. And we are interested in 

18 pay for its success social impact bond funding 

19 and opportunities with governments and 

20 organizations. 

21 I want to use investments to fund web app 

22 development and data collection and analysis. 
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1 People already play the sustainable consumption 

2 game, but they don't know their score. I want to 

3 help people measure their score. Also, I wish to 

4 incentivize people to improve their score. 

5 World Watch Institute says meat 

6 production and animal production accounts for 51 

7 percent of carbon equivalent emissions. Many 

8 other studies agree that at least one-fifth or 23 

9 percent of greenhouse gas emissions originate 

10 from agriculture. Even if it is not 50 percent 

11 of the greenhouse gases, switching to a plant12 based diet cuts emissions of food in half, and we 

13 see the benefits in 15 years compared to CO2 

14 which will stick around for hundreds of years. 

15 Thank you. 

16 MS. DUNHAM: Thank you very much. 

17 Mr. Burkett? 

18 MR. BURKETT: Yes, my name is Tom 

19 Burkett. That's T-O-M, B-U-R-K-E-T-T. I'm a 

20 Co-Director of Virginia River Healers, a citizen 

21 in Virginia and a Professor at Virginia 

22 Commonwealth University. I'm not speaking on 
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1 part of the University; I'm speaking as a 

2 resident of Virginia and the Co-Director of the 

3 VRH. 

4 The VRH is a citizen driven environmental 

5 group that conducts independent testing for 

6 concerned Virginians dealing with soil, water, 

7 and air toxicity issues. The VRH is committed to 

8 producing open source data through specific 

9 analysis and generating information for 

10 environmental defense and citizen arms. 

11 At this point the VRH has produced coal 

12 ash reports on various Dominion Power coal ash 

13 ponds and landfills. These analysis -- analyses 

14 allow citizens to get specific information 

15 regarding trace metals and carcinogenic toxins in 

16 their air and well water due to the proximity of 

17 Dominion Power's coal plants and coal ash 

18 landfills. 

19 Through communal synchronization the VRH 

20 plans to continue to gain access to facilities 

21 where state and federal legality and organization 

22 has failed to monitor and expose the information 
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1 we need in times of geographic precarity. 

2 Environmentalism has become a very large 

3 and conceptual project. As the current 

4 conversation of global warming and carbon 

5 emissions gets pushed further into an alienating 

6 global conversation, these community and regional 

7 conferences remain an important way to address 

8 the immediate issues of the state's energy 

9 industry and our personal health. 

10 Two words: clean and power mark the 

11 title of the proposed plan. I would like to talk 

12 about the epistemic structure of the term clean 

13 power. Power is the ability to influence or 

14 control of behavior of people. Authority of 

15 power in our state is perceived as legitimate by 

16 the current structure of energy production. The 

17 current monopoly of Virginia's energy industry 

18 has created authoritative power structure that 

19 just disposes of people subservient to Dominion's 

20 power. 

21 But to be dispossessed by such a power 

22 structure is to occupy a place of non-being where 
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1 a precarious dependence upon energy production 

2 norms, such as coal, regulates the way life is 

3 lived. 

4 Dispossession originally referred to the 

5 practices of land encroachment, but the 

6 escalation of laissez-faire capitalism has 

7 expanded the structure of the word into something 

8 much broader. Dispossession now speaks to how 

9 human bodies, through power structures 

10 originating from an inherent ownership of 

11 property, become materialized and dematerialized 

12 through various histories of slavery, 

13 colonization, apartheid, democratic alienation, 

14 and now climate and homeostasis change. 

15 Virginia's communities are paying the 

16 cost of a resource curse, living amongst the 

17 toxic air and well water from airborne dust and 

18 leeching metals of Dominion's Power coal ash 

19 landfills. The reinforced political 

20 irrationality of coal in the state has formed a 

21 post-environment where human rights are 

22 compromised. Environmental disposition now 
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1 becomes both a physical and psychological abuse 

2 of our rights. Industries are able to construct 

3 our legitimacy through the use of land and 

4 dispossess those who live near industrial 

5 property. This act of dispossession will 

6 continue to attempt of turning many Virginians 

7 into illegitimate subjects and second-class 

8 citizens unless that order of power is reversed. 

9 Clean. Clean is to be free from dirt. 

10 To clean a wound is to make sure it is safe from 

11 contamination and disease. A clean soul is a 

12 soul that is free from moral corruption and 

13 sinister activities of any kind. 

14 Inhale. If you take a deep breath and 

15 the air that comes through your throat, pours 

16 down your trachea, fills your bronchi and forces 

17 your alveoli to expand. Now do this in the same 

18 -- do the same activity in the Virginian towns of 

19 Bremo, Chesterfield, and Clover, and the air that 

20 your diaphragm is now forcing down your 

21 bronchioles is filling your alveoli and coating 

22 thin layers of blood tissue with chromium, lead, 
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1 and arsenic from dust and the emissions of the 

2 town's power plants and landfills. 

3 With a Congress that is currently in 

4 fever over a health care bill and immigration 

5 reform that has been shouted as an infringement 

6 on religious freedom and our civil liberties, it 

7 seems fair to ask why the inability for a newborn 

8 to breathe without such sin filling their 

9 developing blood tissue is not considered an 

10 afront to religious freedom. Virginia demands a 

11 clean environment free of such sin, industrial 

12 perversion, and spiritual recklessness. We 

13 demand an environment that fosters religious 

14 freedom. 

15 Clean Power would mean the current 

16 structure of energy policy would be to properly 

17 enforce regulation in our state, a regulation 

18 that balances the playing field for developmental 

19 -- development of alternative energy resources 

20 and decreased consumption. 

21 Three things we need added to this plan: 

22 This plan would mark the most progressive 
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1 regulations on carbon emissions to date, but 

2 clean air is not going to come from only 

3 regulating carbon emissions at the point of 

4 combustion. Many harmful forms of energy by5 products are left out. We need to see that the 

6 dust particulates caused from coal ash landfills 

7 make that list. as we have seen from experience 

8 with the adaptation of new scrubbers in coal 

9 plants, this modification continues to produce 

10 greater amounts of toxic waste. 

11 Address transparency: The public needs 

12 to know the testing results of the air and water 

13 that are they -- that are they -- that they are 

14 breathing and ingesting. 

15 The plan needs to come sooner, and please 

16 warn the states that oppose this plan what they 

17 will create without adoption of their plan's 

18 regulation is a citizen base that is held in 

19 environmental terror by energy corporations. 

20 Thank you. 

21 MS. DUNHAM: Thank you very much. Thanks 

22 to both of you. 
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1 Next I'd like to invite Todd Nedwick and 

2 Amanda Hurowitz to the table. 

3 AUDIENCE MEMBER: She's feeding her baby. 

4 MS. DUNHAM: Oh, okay. Do we -- is she 

5 ready? 

6 (Pause.) 

7 Okay. Well, let's start with Mr. 

8 Nedwick. Go ahead. 

9 MR. NEDWICK: Good afternoon. My name is 

10 Todd Nedwick. That's T-O-D-D, N, as in Nancy11 E-D-W-I-C-K. 

12 I am the Housing and Energy Efficiency 

13 Policy Director with the National Housing Trust, 

14 a national nonprofit dedicated to protecting and 

15 improving existing affordable rental housing. 

16 We own and operate about 3,500 affordable 

17 apartments throughout the Mid Atlantic. We have 

18 seen firsthand the impact of utility costs on our 

19 residents' ability to make ends meet and on our 

20 ability as a property owner to maintain 

21 affordable rents while investing in resident 

22 services and building improvements. 
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1 Energy efficiency is a critically 

2 important tool to help preserve affordable rental 

3 housing and reduce the energy burden on low 

4 income renters. Unfortunately, multifamily 

5 rental homes have been found to have far fewer 

6 energy efficiency measures than any other type of 

7 housing. And spending by renters on home energy 

8 has increased by 53 percent from 2000 to 2010. 

9 That's more than twice the rate of growth in 

10 spending on all other goods and services. 

11 The National Housing Trust strongly 

12 supports the Clean Power Plan because of the 

13 environmental and health benefits it will 

14 provide. We also applaud the EPA for taking 

15 steps in the final rule to ensure that the 

16 benefits of the CPP are shared equitably with low 

17 income vulnerable households. 

18 I think EPA said it best on page 1,317 of 

19 the Final Rule: It is important to ensure that 

20 all communities share in the benefits of this 

21 program. And while we estimate that its benefits 

22 will greatly exceed its cost, it is also 
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1 important to ensure that to the extent there are 

2 increases in electricity costs, that those do not 

3 fall disproportionately on those least able to 

4 afford them. 

5 In order to ensure that low income 

6 renters are not burdened by higher utility bills, 

7 NHT and our partners will encourage states to 

8 maximize incentives for energy efficiency 

9 investments in low income housing in their 

10 compliance plans. 

11 With respect to the Clean Energy 

12 Incentive program we make the following 

13 recommendations which are focused on maximizing 

14 the benefits for low income households. 

15 First, eligibility for energy efficiency 

16 projects under the CEIP should be limited to 

17 truly hard-to-reach sectors, including low income 

18 residential housing, both single and multi-family 

19 homes. 

20 Second, EPA should not rely solely on a 

21 geographic based definition of community. Doing 

22 so would exclude some low income households from 
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1 benefitting. There are thousands of affordable 

2 multifamily buildings throughout the country that 

3 are not located in high poverty communities but 

4 are home to very low income families. In some 

5 cases these properties are the only source of 

6 affordable housing in the community. Reducing 

7 energy usage in these properties would help 

8 significantly to ensure continued operation with 

9 affordable rents. 

10 Therefore, EPA's definition of low income 

11 communities should also encompass the option of 

12 qualifying a project based on household 

13 demographics -- in other words, household level 

14 income status. 

15 One disadvantage of using a demographic16 based definition is the potential administrative 

17 burden of verifying household incomes. It is 

18 especially burdensome to verify household income 

19 levels in multifamily buildings where there can 

20 be up to a hundred units or more. 

21 To address this challenge, EPA should 

22 work with the Department of Housing and Urban 
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1 Development to identify properties that are 

2 already subject to income verification processes 

3 and designate such properties as automatically 

4 eligible to participate in the CEIP. 

5 This was the approach that the Department 

6 of Energy took during the expansion of the 

7 Weatherization Assistance Program under the 

8 Federal Stimulus. 

9 Our third and final recommendation for 

10 the CEIP relates to how EPA proposes to divide 

11 the pool of matching early action credits between 

12 renewable energy and energy efficiency projects. 

13 EPA should designate more than 50 percent of the 

14 early action credits for energy efficiency 

15 projects in low income communities. 

16 There are persistent barriers to 

17 efficiency investments in the hard-to-reach low 

18 income sectors. In contract, there has been 

19 impressive growth in the utility scale in 

20 residential solar markets in the U.S. with as 

21 much as 40 percent of all new electricity 

22 generating capacity in the last year coming from 
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1 solar, calling into question the necessity of 

2 using the CEIP to further incent solar energy 

3 development. 

4 Furthermore, to the extent there are 

5 already action credits provided for solar energy 

6 development, eligible projects should be limited 

7 to community solar and distributed solar energy 

8 projects targeted to affordable homes in low 

9 income communities. Doing so would align the 

10 CEIP with the federal government's initiative to 

11 increase access to solar energy for low and 

12 moderate income communities. 

13 This initiative includes a goal to 

14 install 300 megawatts of renewable energy in 

15 federally subsidized affordable homes. The CEIP 

16 should be used to help advance this important 

17 goal. 

18 Thanks for your time. 

19 MS. DUNHAM: Thank you very much. 

20 Ms. Hurowitz, when you're ready. 

21 MS. HUROWITZ: Hi. Here we go. Let me 

22 see if we can do this without waking her up. 
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1 MS. DUNHAM: That would be impressive to 

2 do. 

3 MS. HUROWITZ: Oh, thank you. Here we 

4 go. 

5 My name is Amanda Hurowitz, and this is 

6 my daughter, Daisy. She's five and a half months 

7 old. We live in Woodley Park here in Washington, 

8 D.C. I'm currently on maternity leave, but in 

9 August I'll return to teaching social studies at 

10 Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and 

11 Technology in Northern Virginia. 

12 My students and I are really concerned 

13 about climate change, and we're doing everything 

14 we can in our lives and local communities to 

15 fight it. Here are some of the highlights: 

16 I've worked with my students to raise 

17 money to put a solar array on the roof of their 

18 school which former EPA Administrator Lisa 

19 Jackson actually spoke at our kick-off and helped 

20 to dedicate it. 

21 We traveled to Wise County in the heart 

22 of Appalachia to unsuccessfully stop Virginia 
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1 from building a coal fire power plant. 

2 We've lobbied our members of Congress, 

3 our state governments, our local governments. 

4 We've spoken at Green Building conferences. We 

5 participated in too many rallies to count. 

6 Some of us have become vegetarians. And 

7 in my personal life when we bought a house two 

8 years ago, we immediately installed solar panels, 

9 changed the light bulbs to LEDs, programmed the 

10 thermostat, and haven't had our meter run past 

11 zero since then. 

12 But I'm not naïve enough to think that 

13 our actions in our communities alone can stop a 

14 problem like global warming. I teach social 

15 studies, and one of my favorite eras to teach 

16 about is the progressive era. That's when we 

17 switch from a gilded age, laissez-faire political 

18 culture that failed to address the problems 

19 created by industrialization to the idea that the 

20 government can be the solution. Regulating CO2 

21 emissions and other greenhouse gases is the 

22 proper role of government. 
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1 Individual action, while important, was 

2 not enough to tackle the problems of the gilded 

3 age, and it's not enough to tackle the problems 

4 of our age. Businesses are in the business of 

5 making money. It's not their job to protect 

6 human health, but it is the responsibility of 

7 government to protect the health of its citizens. 

8 Retiring coal fired power plants will do just 

9 that. 

10 I, and my sister, who's over there, grew 

11 up on Long Island. Our home was devastated by 

12 Hurricane Sandy. It wasn't the rain. There was, 

13 in fact, very little precipitation. It was the 

14 storm surge. Sea level rise is always scary in 

15 the abstract, but the reality was so much more 

16 so. We lost two cars, a boiler, had to gut the 

17 first floor down to the studs. Fish showed up in 

18 our closets. My parents had no electricity for 

19 weeks, and no heat for over a month. 

20 Having seen this up close I can tell you 

21 that reducing greenhouse gas emissions is much, 

22 much, much more cost efficient than dealing with 
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1 the consequences of global warming. 

2 Finally, I used to think it rather cheesy 

3 when parents talked about their children in these 

4 contexts, but now that I have one of my own, I'm 

5 beginning to understand that impulse. We put so 

6 much time and effort into raising our children. 

7 We want to leave them a world where their life 

8 won't be cut short by an asthma attack, where 

9 they don't have to worry about hurricanes 

10 flooding their home, or the myriad other 

11 geopolitical consequences of the warming world. 

12 That is why I'm here today to implore you 

13 to create a Federal Implementation Plan with 

14 aggressive targets. It should cover new as well 

15 as old power plants. It should not have 

16 loopholes for dirty energy, and we should 

17 prioritize energy efficiency and incentives for 

18 wind, especially offshore, and solar energy. 

19 The Supreme Court has reaffirmed the 

20 EPA's authority under the Clean Air Act multiple 

21 times, and regardless of what the Senate just 

22 did, the Supreme Court here is the institution 
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1 that matters. In fact, it was the Supreme Court 

2 who ordered the EPA to create these rules in the 

3 first place. 

4 The reality is that we are downwind of 

5 many states who are just not going to clean up 

6 their act unless EPA acts forcefully. They are 

7 putting us and Daisy here in serious risk. It's 

8 just wrong, and we need your help to protect us. 

9 The impact of global warming and other 

10 air pollution will be felt by all of us. If 

11 states fail to create their own Clean Power 

12 Plans, it is your job to step in. Please be 

13 aggressive. 

14 Daisy wants clean air, and she's not 

15 going to stop drooling until she gets it. 

16 (Laughter.) 

17 MS. DUNHAM: Thank you very much. Thank 

18 you both -- all three of you. 

19 All right. Next I'd like to invite Sara 

20 Chieffo and Ann Valdez to the table. 

21 And, Ms. Chieffo, when you're ready, 

22 great. 
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1 MS. CHIEFFO: Thanks. So, thank you guys 

2 for taking the time to provide this critical 

3 opportunity for all of us to comment. We know it 

4 takes a lot of resources and your time, so thank 

5 you. 

6 My name is Sara Chieffo spelled S-A-R-A; 

7 last name C-H-I-E-F-F-O. 

8 And first, let me start by just saying 

9 why I'm here today. I'm here as a mom and asthma 

10 sufferer whose asthma is worse during smog and 

11 summer seasons; and I'm also here as the Vice12 President of Government Affairs at the League of 

13 Conservation Voters. 

14 I feel very lucky to be part of LCV's 

15 team, and our mission is to turn environmental 

16 values into national, state, and local 

17 priorities. We work to advance these goals in 

18 close partnership with over 30 state partners. 

19 And the science is clear. I'm sure 

20 you've heard a lot of these points today that I'm 

21 going to make, but let me just reiterate. The 

22 science is clear. Climate change is here, and we 
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1 are the main cause. Across the country people 

2 are seeing the impacts right outside their 

3 windows. This is no longer a distant problem 

4 people can no longer feel and touch. 

5 Whether it's the devastation wrought by 

6 extreme storms like Super Storm Sandy and the -- 

7 and the compassionate story you just heard or the 

8 devastating drought hitting my home state of 

9 California or the wildfires and floods in 

10 Colorado. These are expensive and real impacts 

11 that lead to lost lives, and we have a 

12 responsibility to act. 

13 Also on the economic front, our nation is 

14 already footing the bill for climate change. In 

15 2013 there were seven separate weather and 

16 climate disasters whose price tags exceeded $1 

17 billion. As was commented earlier, it's much 

18 more expensive to deal with the causes of climate 

19 change than the impacts. 

20 Doctors, nurses, scientists, military 

21 leaders, and other experts have sounded the 

22 alarm. If we don't act, carbon pollution will 
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1 lead to catastrophic impacts. Climate change, as 

2 you've heard, is a clear threat to our health. 

3 The rising temperatures make smog pollution 

4 worse, triggering asthma attacks like my own and 

5 my twin sisters, and even permanently damaging 

6 children's developing lungs. 

7 Fortunately, on the positive side the 

8 solutions to climate change -- that is, moving 

9 away from fossil fuels provide a significant 

10 opportunity to create jobs, reduce energy waste, 

11 and save consumers money. 

12 Fossil fuel fired power plants which is 

13 what is at the heart of this proposal are the 

14 single largest source of carbon pollution in our 

15 country, and they account for more than a third 

16 of annual global warming emissions. The Clean 

17 Power Plan is a very big deal. 

18 Until now these polluters have been 

19 allowed to dump unlimited amounts of carbon 

20 pollution into our air for free. Finally, that's 

21 going to come to an end. This plan sets exciting 

22 state-by-state pollution reduction targets, and 
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1 it empowers states to craft the solutions that 

2 work best for them. 

3 Now if states fail to act, as we know 

4 many will, the EPA has the responsibility and the 

5 authority under the Clean Air Act to step in. 

6 And that's why this proposed Federal 

7 Implementation Plan and getting it done right is 

8 so important. It's a critical backstop to make 

9 sure that all communities are protected 

10 regardless of what their governors do or do not 

11 do. Whether they decide to seize the opportunity 

12 to chart their own paths or whether or not they 

13 follow Mitch McConnell and the just say no 

14 strategy to acting on climate change. 

15 The Federal Implementation Plan is also 

16 an opportunity to provide a model for states as 

17 they develop their own plans. 

18 To that end we encourage you to finalize 

19 a strong Federal Implementation Plan that ensures 

20 that all communities are protected. This 

21 includes low income and communities of color who 

22 currently suffer disproportionately from air 
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1 pollution. 

2 The plan should also maximize utilities' 

3 incentives to invest in energy efficiency and 

4 save consumers' money while providing a clear 

5 process for meaningful community engagement and 

6 input. 

7 Limiting carbon pollution is really, 

8 really popular, including enjoying support from 

9 four out of five young people, people with the 

10 most at stake in this challenge. So, I've turned 

11 yellow, so I will -- or orange so I will -- I 

12 will wrap up here. 

13 But these standards are so common sense 

14 that people assume they're already in place. So, 

15 I want to end with a vote of confidence for you 

16 guys. Go ahead. Momentum's on our side, and we 

17 would not be here today without the leadership 

18 both of Administrator McCarthy and the President 

19 who is really leading the charge both here at 

20 home and across the world to make sure that we 

21 tackle this challenge as a global community. 

22 And let me just close by saying, you 
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1 know, I get to feel like I wear an invisible cape 

2 a lot of days and be a crusader for clean air and 

3 fight for a safer planet, and I -- I feel really 

4 lucky to dedicate my -- my career to that; but, 

5 you know, I have a whole new sense of 

6 responsibility. 

7 When I first testified a few years ago 

8 about the idea of EPA setting these limits that 

9 we're here today to talk about, I was newly 

10 married and really, you know, so much 

11 opportunity. And now I am just trying to catch 

12 up with my two and a half year old, so thank you 

13 on behalf of my daughter Stella for all that 

14 you're doing and all we're doing together to make 

15 sure we have clean air and a safer planet. 

16 MS. DUNHAM: Thank you very much. 

17 Ms. Valdez. 

18 MS. VALDEZ: Hello, my name is Ann 

19 Valdez. 

20 MS. DUNHAM: Valdez. 

21 MS. VALDEZ: A-N-N, V-A-L-D-E-Z. 

22 As I said, my name is Ann Valdez, and I'm 
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1 a leader at Community Voices Heard in New York 

2 State and a member of National People's Action. 

3 I am a resident of Coney Island in 

4 Brooklyn, New York, where Hurricane Sandy had a 

5 devastating effect on families that should be 

6 going through a massive rebuilding three years 

7 later, yet there -- they are more concerned with 

8 construction of recreational facilities for non9 residents than homes. 

10 Three years after the devastation of 

11 Hurricane Sandy thousands of people are still 

12 suffering from the effects of the storm. As one 

13 of the thousands of families living in public 

14 housing, we are still working with the temporary 

15 boilers that were provided after the regular 

16 system failed to provide heat and hot water. 

17 Three days before the storm hit I was 

18 forced to evacuate with my family from our 

19 development at Gravesend houses in Coney Island 

20 to a public school to access safety. We stayed 

21 there in a classroom for five days and then were 

22 moved to a very crowded environment in a high 
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1 school which lasted for one week where safety and 

2 hygiene became an issue. 

3 We returned back to our public housing 

4 residence in Coney Island to avoid the 

5 overcrowding and safety challenges and were met 

6 with no heat or hot water for more than a week. 

7 Returning to the community I was 

8 evacuated from and the place that I called home 

9 to be -- to be proved to be traumatic. I see all 

10 the destruction and devastation was painful and 

11 dampened our spirits. We returned to see no real 

12 rebuilding or anyone to ask for needed resources. 

13 Instead, we saw investment in entertainment 

14 centers and other projects aimed at encouraging 

15 people from the outside to benefit from the 

16 devastation experienced by those who called Coney 

17 Island home. 

18 As a leader and resident of New York, we 

19 recognized that investment on the part of the 

20 federal government is critical to rebuilding 

21 efforts for all who have experienced this kind of 

22 destruction. We need investment in cleaner 
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1 energy, not in energy that is produced by -- by 

2 continued reliance on fossil fuels. We need 

3 solar energy and wind power installed on public 

4 facilities like the flat roofs of most schools 

5 and public housing developments. 

6 We need investment, and training, and 

7 employment that would enable low income residents 

8 of Sandy affected areas to get well paying jobs 

9 and move beyond the chain of poverty jobs. We 

10 need the Federal Implementation Plan and the 

11 Clean Power Plan to create good quality green 

12 jobs in our neighborhoods and for our neighbors. 

13 I am here to encourage all of us to see 

14 this as an opportunity to rebuild the way we 

15 participate in thinking about and acting on our 

16 climate challenges. We believe in pushing the 

17 powerful in our nation to listen to and encourage 

18 people of color and low income people in a 

19 meaningful -- oh, engage people of color and low 

20 income people in a meaningful participation 

21 focused on our resiliency as a nation in response 

22 to those challenging climate changes that affect 
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1 us all. 

2 I also would like to say I am also a 

3 mother of three and grandmother of three. My 

4 youngest grandchild just turned four months old. 

5 (Crying.) Sorry. 

6 MS. DUNHAM: Take your time. 

7 MS. VALDEZ: I want him to be able to 

8 live and be able to breathe and not have to be 

9 like so many children on a nebulizer, on 

10 machines, and on medication for his life. Thank 

11 you. 

12 MS. DUNHAM: Thank you. Thank you to 

13 both of you. Thank you for sharing your stories. 

14 Okay. Next I'd like to call up Kate 

15 Addleson and the Reverend Paul Wilson. 

16 Ms. Addleson, when you're ready. 

17 MS. ADDLESON: Yes. Thank you so much 

18 for the opportunity to speak today. I actually 

19 am speaking on behalf of Richard H. Ball, Ph.D., 

20 Retired Energy Policy and Technology Analyst. 

21 Would you like me to spell his name? 

22 MS. DUNHAM: Yes, please. 
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1 MS. ADDLESON: Richard, R-I-C-H-A-R-D; 

2 Ball, B-A-L-L. 

3 Climate change is a critical global 

4 issue, and the world must move rapidly to 

5 mitigate it. EPA's Clean Power Plan clearly is a 

6 central part of the U.S. effort to combat climate 

7 change, and it is very important to U.S. efforts 

8 to obtain a sound, international agreement in 

9 Paris at COP21. I strongly support the Clean 

10 Power Plan and want to see it succeed in its 

11 goals. 

12 I will focus here on a few points about 

13 how the Federal Implementation Plan should be 

14 formulated to advance the overall Clean Power 

15 Plan goals. On Virginia's State Implementation 

16 Plan: The final Clean Power Plan rule gives 

17 states great flexibility. My state of Virginia 

18 got off relatively easy in terms of its final 

19 rate and mass targets. I am very concerned that 

20 CO2 emissions could actually increase 

21 substantially under some of the options open to 

22 the state, especially if new sources are not 
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1 capped under our state implementation plan or a 

2 FIP. 

3 Virginia currently is headed towards a 

4 future power system heavily focused on natural 

5 gas power plants as evidenced by the 2015 

6 Integrated Resource Plan of our largest utility 

7 company. Natural gas is a fossil fuel that will 

8 continue to emit CO2, cause damage from fracking 

9 operations, and leak substantial methane into the 

10 atmosphere from the natural gas fuel cycle. 

11 If our state is unable to submit a 

12 satisfactory state implementation plan, we need 

13 to have a sound federal implementation plan as an 

14 alternative. 

15 On EPA's proposed Federal Implementation 

16 Plan -- EPA's proposed that left open many 

17 possible options, some of which could lead to 

18 undesirable outcomes. For example, it appears 

19 that undesirable sources of power could directly, 

20 through lax state rules on qualified biogenic 

21 sources or indirectly be allowed including waste 

22 to energy, landfill gas, and wood burning in 
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1 power plants that will actually increase CO2 

2 emissions while -- while -- excuse me -- 

3 decimating our forests. More generally, the 

4 proposed rule could give allowances back to the 

5 companies responsible for emitting carbon 

6 pollution, allow states to increase their total 

7 carbon pollution emissions from the power sector 

8 by increasing natural gas use instead of wind, 

9 solar, and efficiency or otherwise fall short of 

10 its goals. 

11 To avoid the most serious potential 

12 problems, the Federal Implementation should, one, 

13 be as strong as possible to provide a good model 

14 for state development -- state developed 

15 implementation plans. It is especially -- excuse 

16 me. It especially should not reward states that 

17 fail to submit a satisfactory SIP or encourage 

18 states to fall back on the Federal Implementation 

19 Plan as a less stringent plan for reducing carbon 

20 pollution emissions. 

21 If the FIP is not strong, it will tempt 

22 many political forces within a state to torpedo 
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1 preparation of a State Implementation Plan if it 

2 appears that they can achieve their goals of 

3 doing the least -- excuse me -- excuse me -- of 

4 doing the least possible through a Federal 

5 Implementation Plan. It is often easier 

6 politically to kill a program than to create one. 

7 Two, to maximum -- to the maximum extent 

8 feasible, include measures that encourage energy 

9 efficiency, clean solar and wind energy rather 

10 than investments in new natural gas fossil energy 

11 generation that would lock in carbon emissions 

12 well into the future. 

13 Three, lead to maximum reductions of 

14 total carbon pollution from the electric power 

15 sector in the state, including covered and 

16 uncovered or new sources, or from a group of 

17 cooperating trading states The most direct and 

18 certain way to achieve that would be to include 

19 new as well as existing sources under a mass20 based cap, if feasible, or as an alternative at 

21 least set aside and retire a substantial 

22 proportion of state allowances. 
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1 Further, protect low income consumers by 

2 maximizing utilities' incentives to invest in 

3 energy efficiency which -- which lowers all 

4 household energy bills and especially to invest 

5 heavily in free efficiency measures applied to 

6 low income households. 

7 In addition, not allocate allowances to 

8 fossil fuel electric generating units. Reward 

9 historical emissions of carbon pollution or be 

10 based on historical generation by fossil fuel 

11 electric generating units since that encourages 

12 future emissions. Rather, allowances preferably 

13 should be auctioned and proceeds directed to 

14 public purposes, including off-sending Clean 

15 Power Plan program costs that would raise 

16 electricity rates to residential and commercial 

17 customers, incentivizing efficiency and renewable 

18 energy generation, alleviating energy costs to 

19 low income consumers, funding climate change 

20 resiliency programs, protecting citizens against 

21 environmental justice impacts or regional 

22 economic development in regions adversely 
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1 affected by economic impacts of declining coal 

2 use. 

3 And I will -- I see that the time has 

4 lapsed, so I will encourage him to submit these 

5 in writing to you as well. Thank you so much. 

6 MS. DUNHAM: Thank you very much. 

7 Reverend Wilson, when you're ready. 

8 REV. WILSON: Thank you. My name is 

9 Reverend Paul M. Wilson, P-A-U-L, middle initial 

10 M, last name Wilson, W-I-L-S-O-N. I am the 

11 senior pastor of Union Hill and Union Road 

12 Baptist Churches located in rural Buckingham 

13 County, Virginia. 

14 I am present today because of those two 

15 churches, member of the Friends of Buckingham and 

16 of several local church bodies who -- we have 

17 over -- our two churches have about 250 members, 

18 but I also represent our church body -- the 

19 immediate body which has about 4,000 members. 

20 And then I can name some other state bodies as 

21 well. 

22 I'm here to bring attention of the plight 
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1 of people who live and work in what is being 

2 proposed for our community, the proposed ACP 

3 project designated to pass through Buckingham 

4 County, Virginia, with its proposed 41,000 

5 horsepower compression station for our locality 

6 is unacceptable and contrary to our tranquil and 

7 peaceful way of life. 

8 The proposed compression station will 

9 have a direct and undesirable affect. One, 

10 health concerns; two, environmental concerns; and 

11 three, financial viability of our community. 

12 Our two churches, one church with two 

13 locations, lie less than one mile of the proposed 

14 compressor station with -- and we will suffer 

15 immeasurable harm. 

16 Other than the monetary promises made by 

17 the immense corporations such as Dominion Power, 

18 Duke, et cetera, why are not the moral 

19 implications being addressed? Why have 

20 politicians and the like been bamboozled, 

21 hoodwinked, et cetera, to side with big business, 

22 and our church community, primarily 250 elderly 
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1 African-Americans with immeasurable health 

2 concerns, be ambushed by corporate America and 

3 being told in a heavy-handed unconvoluted manner 

4 what is best for us, our community? 

5 What good does a proposed compressor 

6 station bring to our tranquil and historic area? 

7 The energy industry has a poor and dismal record 

8 at best, a poor track record in maintaining 

9 government accepted standards of pollutants. Why 

10 is our community being pushed aside and stepped 

11 over in the name of progress and financial gain 

12 for big business and the like? Why must our 

13 community be expected to be and accept the 

14 definition and sacrificial lamb or acceptable 

15 collateral damage? Our community and lives and 

16 way of life do matter. 

17 The Clean Power Act is to protect us and 

18 communities -- our communities and the like, not 

19 destroy us and regulate communities like ours to 

20 what once was and today not is. Five hundred and 

21 eighty-five million pounds a year of hazardous 

22 pollutants, including methanes, monoxides, 
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1 nitrogen oxides, volatile organic compounds, 

2 formaldehydes, et cetera, into our community air, 

3 water, soils is totally unacceptable in our 

4 community. 

5 If we cannot be heard, listened to, or 

6 address, what is the purpose of hearings and of 

7 forums such as these? Our community is unable to 

8 relocate. It's not about in your back yard. We 

9 are concerned about all yards. Listen to the 

10 people who will be most affected. 

11 The previous studies, reports, statistics 

12 -- and I think that you already have most of that 

13 stuff -- support our position. But if we had 

14 five and half billion dollars to spend such as 

15 the ACP is proposing to spend, then maybe little 

16 people like us could be heard. 

17 Now we're the people who live there. My 

18 folk -- and my church where I'm pastor and I've 

19 been there for about 18 years. I've been a 

20 pastor in Virginia for the last 43 years, been in 

21 ministry for 45. I have witnessed a whole of 

22 destruction by big business. And we just refuse 
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1 to be pushed over and accept the standards of 

2 what big business is proposing for us and trying 

3 to tell us what is safe for us. 

4 The record already speaks for itself. 

5 And if we look through other communities, we have 

6 already seen the damages that it has been -- you 

7 know, that has been done. So we just want to be 

8 heard. We do not want the compressor station, 

9 nor the pipeline in our historic community. 

10 I think that's about five minutes. Thank 

11 you. 

12 MS. DUNHAM: Okay. Thank you very much. 

13 Thank you. Thanks to both of you. 

14 Next I would like to invite Erica Wagner 

15 and Emily Becker to the table, please. 

16 Okay. Let me just -- I'm sorry. You're 

17 Ms. Wagner or Ms. Becker? 

18 MS. BECKER: Ms. Becker. 

19 MS. DUNHAM: Becker, okay. Is Erica 

20 Wagner here? 

21 (No response.) 

22 No. Okay. Why don't you go when you're 
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1 ready, Ms. Becker? 

2 MS. BECKER: Okay. My name is Emily 

3 Becker, E-M-I-L-Y, B-E-C-K-E-R. 

4 I'd like to thank you for the opportunity 

5 to submit formal testimony regarding EPA's 

6 Proposed Clean Power Plan. And like I said, my 

7 name's Emily Becker, and I'm here today both in 

8 my own capacity as a citizen. I come from 

9 Pennsylvania, but also from the National Wildlife 

10 Federation -- to express my strong support for 

11 EPA's historic action to combat climate change by 

12 setting limits on carbon pollution from our 

13 existing power plants. 

14 I'm an intern at the National Wildlife 

15 Federation, preparing to go to the UNF Triple C 

16 COP in Paris which begins in 11 days. 

17 While NWF has a national focus aiming to 

18 protect our nation's wildlife, wild spaces, and 

19 citizens, we also recognize that climate impacts 

20 are not just national. I believe that the U.S. 

21 needs to be a leader when it comes to decreasing 

22 emissions and acting on climate change; and the 
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1 Clean Power Plan is a step in this direction, 

2 aiming to protect our own communities and 

3 decrease climate emissions which claimed this 

4 larger global issue. 

5 In many ways the U.S. has been slow to 

6 act on -- or in some cases even accept the 

7 problem of climate change even as we are slammed 

8 with weather events, droughts, and fires. 

9 By reducing reliance on coal burning for 

10 power generation in the U.S., the Clean Power 

11 Plan will help protect wildlife and people by 

12 reducing not only carbon pollution but other 

13 harmful pollutants like mercury that poison fish 

14 and threaten all those who eat them. 

15 The Clean Power Plan will reduce the need 

16 for more coal mining that's destroying precious 

17 wildlife habitat and sends a strong message 

18 globally that the U.S. is willing to protect us 

19 as well as act on climate more broadly. 

20 For states that do not create their own 

21 plans to cut carbon pollution from power plants, 

22 we, the National Wildlife Federation and I, 
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1 personally, commend the EPA for creating this 

2 backstop federal guaranty for reducing carbon 

3 pollution. 

4 The federal plan should be strong and 

5 aimed at protecting people and wildlife from 

6 power plant carbon pollution in order to ensure 

7 proper pollution reductions and to encourage 

8 wildlife-friendly renewable energy solutions. 

9 The proposed plan should be finalized in a timely 

10 manner so that states have time to use it to 

11 guide the formulation of their own plans. 

12 As an intern in D.C. I'm just starting my 

13 career, but in a big way by participating in the 

14 COP as a badged delegate. I'm proud to be able 

15 to go to Paris and say that the U.S. is acting on 

16 climate through the Clean Power Plan and the 

17 Federal Implementation Plan will play a huge role 

18 in the success of this. Thank you. 

19 MS. DUNHAM: Thank you very much. 

20 Okay. I'd like to invite Eli Briggs to 

21 the table and let me just check one more time. 

22 Is Erica Wagner in the room? 
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1 (No response.) 

2 Okay. So then Eli Briggs and I'll -- I'd 

3 like to invite William Penniman to the table as 

4 well. 

5 Okay. Ms. Briggs, when you're -- when 

6 you're ready. 

7 MS. BRIGGS: My name is Eli Briggs, 

8 E-L-I, B-R-I-G-G-S. I am the senior government 

9 affairs director with the National Association of 

10 County and City Health Officials, or NACCHO. We 

11 represent 2,800 local health departments across 

12 the country. And I am here today to testify in 

13 support of strong federal and model plans that 

14 will help drive a shift to cleaner energy 

15 sources, address climate change, and reduce as 

16 much pollution as possible to protect the 

17 public's health. 

18 Local health departments are responsible 

19 for protecting the health and safety of all 

20 people in the jurisdictions they serve, and they 

21 are concerned that -- that climate change can 

22 harm the health of the public through degraded 
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1 air quality, wildfires, drought, heat waves, and 

2 more. These impacts worsen the burden that many 

3 people already suffer because of power plant 

4 pollution. 

5 NACCHO supports the Clean Power Plan to 

6 reduce carbon and other air pollutants that cause 

7 asthma attacks, heart attacks, and premature 

8 death. Local health departments want to make 

9 sure we achieve the Clean Power Plan's estimated 

10 health benefits, including preventing up to 3,600 

11 premature deaths in 2030, preventing 90,000 

12 asthma attacks, and avoiding 300,000 days missed 

13 from work and school each year. 

14 These health benefits will only come if 

15 states develop effective plans to meet the 

16 requirements set out by the EPA in the Clean 

17 Power Plan. And for those states that refuse to 

18 comply, it is critical that EPA have a way to 

19 ensure emissions reductions by taking action at 

20 the federal level. 

21 We support EPA's effort to help the 

22 states develop and adopt effective plans to 
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1 reduce their carbon emissions. Model plans will 

2 help the states focus their time and effort on 

3 choosing the steps that work best for them. 

4 NACCHO strongly supports the Clean Energy 

5 Incentive Program's component that focuses on 

6 energy efficiency improvements in low income 

7 communities. Many residents in low income 

8 communities could benefit from having repairs 

9 done to their homes that can cut energy bills, 

10 and also, communities will benefit from 

11 additional jobs that could be created. 

12 However, EPA needs to do more in the 

13 Model Rule and the Federal Implementation Plan to 

14 ensure that low income communities don't bear -- 

15 don't continue to bear a disproportionate burden 

16 of pollution. Low income communities have 

17 suffered with problems from pollution from coal 

18 fired power plants cited in their communities for 

19 far too long. They have to breathe toxic 

20 emissions like arsenic and lead, and carcinogens 

21 like benzene. They suffer more from the health 

22 impacts of climate change and are more likely to 
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1 have diseases like asthma that increase risks 

2 from air pollution. 

3 EPA's analysis as well as analysis by 

4 Harvard University and others shows the steps to 

5 reduce carbon emissions will also have co6 benefits that reduce other harmful emissions from 

7 these plants. Cleaning up these plants allows 

8 people to live in a healthier environment and 

9 engage in healthy activities like exercise 

10 outdoors. 

11 Actions taken by the Clean Power Plan are 

12 essential, but we remain concerned that some 

13 states will adopt a plan that does not recognize 

14 this continued disproportionate burden for low 

15 income communities and fails to reduce emissions 

16 from all sources. Each state plan should make 

17 sure that they do not continue to 

18 disproportionately burden those who live near the 

19 plants, especially those who are already 

20 economically burdened. 

21 Thank you for the opportunity to testify. 

22 MS. DUNHAM: Thank you. Mr. Penniman, 
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1 when you're ready. 

2 MR. PENNIMAN: Good afternoon. My name 

3 is William Penniman. That's P-E-N-N-I-M-A-N. I 

4 am speaking today on my behalf but also on behalf 

5 of the Virginia Chapter of the Sierra Club and 

6 its 15,000 members which includes myself. 

7 Like all Americans, Virginia's residents, 

8 including my two grandchildren, have a strong 

9 interest in seeing the United States reduce CO2 

10 emissions and other greenhouse gases as much as 

11 possible, as rapidly as possible. As recognized 

12 by EPA, emissions induced climate change is real; 

13 it's occurring now; and it will get worse without 

14 strong measures to reduce the accumulation of 

15 greenhouse gases. Without such measures our 

16 children face potentially catastrophic harms, and 

17 it would be the equivalent of starting our 

18 children down a steepening slick road with 

19 neither brakes nor steering. 

20 Virginia shares many of the 

21 vulnerabilities that all states in the U.S. face 

22 regarding climate change; but in some respects 
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1 we're particularly vulnerable. In particular, 

2 Virginia's coastal communities are the most 

3 vulnerable to sea level rise of any communities 

4 on the east coast, second only to New Orleans on 

5 a national basis. 

6 Our -- our southeastern communities 

7 already routinely experience flooding. And a 

8 storm surge like Hurricane Sandy or even the 

9 enormous rains that recently hit South Carolina 

10 would devastate them as well as the United States 

11 Naval base which is down there and is a critical 

12 economic asset and national security asset for 

13 the Virginia and the U.S. -- yes, for Virginia 

14 and the U.S. 

15 EPA's Power Plan -- Clean Power Plan is a 

16 critical albeit modest first step to reducing CO2 

17 from electric power plants which are the largest 

18 category of CO2 emitters in the United States. 

19 EPA should be sure that the Federal 

20 Implementation Plan is as effective as possible 

21 in reducing CO2 and as early as possible, not 

22 waiting till the last minute; and no state should 
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1 think that accepting an FIP will either allow it 

2 to miss its targets or somehow skate around the 

3 ultimate obligations to reduce CO2. 

4 Trading opportunities should be available 

5 to help minimize the potential costs of CO2 

6 reductions and lay the groundwork for additional 

7 CO2 reductions in the future. 

8 But I want to emphasize that while this 

9 is a first step, it clearly is not enough. The 

10 -- and it's important for how you design the plan 

11 -- the FIP. 

12 As experts have recognized and also most 

13 recently the United States, the -- the developed 

14 countries of the world are going to have to 

15 reduce their emissions by 80 percent by 2050. 

16 The European Union has recently -- well, the U.S. 

17 proposed 80 percent reduction by 2050 in its 

18 recent submission to the United Nations 

19 negotiations. The European Union said 80 to 95 

20 percent reduction in CO2 emissions by 2050. The 

21 reality is that investments being made during the 

22 term of the CPP between now and 2030 will include 
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1 investments that will still be operating in 2050. 

2 And if we are going to avoid severe 

3 problems of stranded assets, wasted investments 

4 that should be avoided, your plan and the EPA 

5 should make -- incentivize people to move to 

6 long-term solutions, not await -- not await 2050 

7 or 2030 and then suddenly be told they need to 

8 make dramatic new changes. 

9 I want to make -- I have written comments 

10 that are more lengthy, but I want to make one 

11 other point. As it reviews the FIP, EPA should 

12 also take a second look at the rate to mass 

13 conversions it calculated for Virginia which 

14 would, of course, would be incorporated into the 

15 FIP. It appears to us that the Virginia's rate16 based target represent a 34 percent reduction in 

17 rates of carbon emission from the 2012 baseline. 

18 That's a very reasonable goal Virginia can meet 

19 by adjusting its resource mix to include more 

20 clean energy and efficiency. 

21 However, the mass-based target for 

22 Virginia appears to be 5 percent higher than the 
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1 2012 baseline. EPA's mass target conversion 

2 appears to have failed to account for the 

3 retirement of several coal fired plants that have 

4 already been announced rather than eliminating 

5 these sources from the mass cap in the years 

6 after their retirement, EPA calculated the cap as 

7 if these sources would continue to emit the same 

8 amount of CO2. Virginia can do better than the 

9 34 percent reduction, both on a rate and mass 

10 basis. And I urge you to reexamine the mass11 based calc you've at least presumptively 

12 included. 

13 Thank you very much. 

14 MS. DUNHAM: Thank you very much. Thanks 

15 to both of you. 

16 All right. I would like to invite Donnel 

17 Baird and Frank Knapp, Jr., please, to the table. 

18 Okay. Mr. Baird, when you're ready. 

19 MR. BAIRD: Good morning. My name is 

20 Donnel Baird, D-O-N-N-E-L, B-A-I-R-D. I am the 

21 CEO of a venture capital backed clean energy 

22 start-up called the Block Power. We are a public 
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1 benefits corporation that prioritizes 

2 environmental outcomes as well as economic 

3 development in inner cities. We're backed by 

4 venture capital lists in Silicon Valley who 

5 invested in technologies such as Uber, Facebook, 

6 Twitter, and Airbnb. 

7 I want to thank the EPA for this awesome 

8 Clean Power Plan. I'd like to speak briefly 

9 about my time as a senior staffer during the 

10 American Recovery and Reinvestment Act which was 

11 another opportunity that we had to dramatically 

12 transform the way that energy is consumed in 

13 American inner cities. Lots of capital was 

14 expended. We've learned lots of best practices. 

15 Some of the investment worked; some of it did 

16 not. 

17 Some of what we learned was that the 

18 opportunity to transition American inner cities 

19 to clean energy requires significant investments 

20 in engineering analysis on a custom building-by21 building basis to analyze and assess the 

22 infrastructure that currently exists and to price 
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1 out the energy savings that would be generated by 

2 making investments. 

3 And the other opportunity exists in the 

4 financing of the transition of those 

5 infrastructure to clean energy. Many of these 

6 communities particularly post financial crisis 

7 are viewed as, you know, subprime and difficult 

8 to underwrite. The use of portfolios in 

9 aggregating projects into at minimum a $3 million 

10 portfolio size spreads out the risk of default on 

11 a building-by-building basis and is what Goldman 

12 Sachs and other Wall Street investment firms 

13 require in order to make investments in clean 

14 energy in inner cities. 

15 On the engineering standpoint, I'd 

16 encourage the EPA to continue to evaluate the 

17 opportunities that new technologies in Silicon 

18 Valley offer us to bring down the cost of 

19 engineering analysis for clean energy in inner 

20 cities, including the use of Smart Sensors and 

21 the Internet of Things to help collect the robust 

22 data that is necessary to feed algorithms that 
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1 allow us to dramatically reduce the engineering 

2 cost that too often prevent investments in clean 

3 energy in inner cities. 

4 So, with those two business opportunities 

5 in mind, I would encourage the EPA to continue to 

6 view American inner cities not as a place that is 

7 a sinkhole or a quagmire for a lot of subsidies 

8 and carbon credits, but instead of a $40 billion 

9 investment opportunity where the use of loan 

10 guaranties and Smart Angel investment or venture 

11 capital-like investments, or, I guess, in policy 

12 parlance Small Business Investment Corporation or 

13 Small Business Investment Research Grants can -- 

14 can really offer an opportunity to leverage the 

15 $40 billion investment opportunity that exists. 

16 With that I will close, and thanks once 

17 again for your time. Thanks. 

18 MS. DUNHAM: Thank you very much. 

19 Mr. Knapp. 

20 MR. KNAPP: Yes, thank you very much. 

21 And congratulations on your stamina for being 

22 through this. 
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1 I'm going to apologize in advance for 

2 reading this, but just five minutes, I want to 

3 make sure I do it right. Okay. 

4 I'm Frank Knapp. I'm Co-Chair of the 

5 American Sustainable Business Council and 

6 President, CEO, and Co-Founder of the South 

7 Carolina Small Business Chamber of Commerce. 

8 The America Sustainable Business 

9 Council's a national alliance of business 

10 associations and individual businesses 

11 representing more than 200,000 businesses and 

12 more than 325,000 entrepreneurs, executives, 

13 managers, and investors. We advocate for public 

14 policies that build a sustainable economy. We 

15 support the Environmental Protection Agency's 

16 Clean Power Plan both for the reduction of carbon 

17 emissions to protect our nation from the economic 

18 damage resulting from the consequences of 

19 unrestrained climate change and to spur new jobs 

20 in a sustainable economy. 

21 The South Carolina Small Business Chamber 

22 of Commerce supports the Clean Power Plan rule 
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1 for the same general reasons. However, we have a 

2 particular burden to provide sound reasons for 

3 enacting rules because we have one of the 24 

4 state attorney generals who are litigating 

5 against the Clean Power Plan. So let me be very 

6 clear. Our Attorney General Allen Wilson is on 

7 the wrong side of this issue. 

8 In addition to the issue of legality 

9 which only the courts can determine, the 

10 litigants complained that the Clean Power Plan 

11 will hurt jobs, raise electricity rates, and 

12 result in unreliable electricity. So let me 

13 outline why the Clean Power Plan is good for 

14 South Carolina. 

15 One, the Clean Power Plan will protect 

16 South Carolina businesses and jobs. South 

17 Carolina's coastal tourism economy is severely 

18 threatened by sea level rise as a result of 

19 carbon pollution cause climate change. From 

20 Cherry Grove in the north to Buford in the south, 

21 beaches, residential areas, and small businesses 

22 will be inundated by ocean with just a few feet 
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1 of higher seas. Scientists have projected up to 

2 a six foot sea level rise by the end of this 

3 century from unrestrained climate change. This 

4 would be a major economic disaster along the 

5 Palmetto State's coast, including up to a third 

6 of the Charleston Peninsula succumbing to the 

7 ocean tides. South Carolina's biggest industry, 

8 tourism, and its tens of thousands of workers 

9 could be lost in this scenario. 

10 Two, the Clean Power Plan will create new 

11 South Carolina jobs. The alternative energy 

12 industry is beginning to expand along with the 

13 jobs, thanks to the South Carolina legislature 

14 passing incentives for solar power. In addition 

15 more jobs will be created from a focus on energy 

16 efficiency to help meet the EPA goal for the 

17 state. 

18 Third, the Clean Power Plan rule will 

19 probably not result in higher electricity rates 

20 in South Carolina than are already anticipated. 

21 Two major -- excuse me -- two major electric 

22 utilities in the state, South Carolina Electric 
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1 and Gas and Santee Cooper are currently building 

2 two nuclear plants just outside of the state 

3 capital. The plants -- started long before the 

4 Clean Power Plan -- are being built with the 

5 support of virtually every member of our congress 

6 delegation, congressional delegation as well as 

7 our state legislature. These new reactors are 

8 expected to enable the state to achieve 80 

9 percent of the state's carbon emission reduction 

10 goal under the Clean Power Plan. The rest will 

11 be relatively easy to obtain through alternative 

12 energy and energy efficiency. We're gaining more 

13 jobs as discussed above. 

14 Thus, Clean Power Plan itself should 

15 require a little additional cost to the South 

16 Carolina ratepayer, but for those states that 

17 don't have a nuclear or alternative energy system 

18 already being constructed, if you're -- if their 

19 electricity rates do rise, it won't be because of 

20 the Clean Power Plan. And it won't -- there 

21 won't be an economic collapse predicted by the 

22 opponents of the Clean Power Plan. You only have 
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1 to look at South Carolina for proof. 

2 Utility SCE and G has raised rates over 

3 17 percent since 2009 just to pay for the 

4 construction cost and construction financing 

5 costs of our new nuclear plants. Ask our 

6 governor. Our state's economy is doing just 

7 fine. 

8 Four of the Clean Power Plan will not 

9 threaten South Carolina's reliable electricity. 

10 South Carolina has a long history of using 

11 nuclear energy to produce electricity, and with 

12 that being the dominant engine in meeting our 

13 Clean Energy Plan goal for the state electricity, 

14 reliability is not an issue. 

15 And five, the Clean Power Plan is favored 

16 by South Carolinians. An opinion poll released 

17 last month shows that 62 percent of South 

18 Carolina voters strongly or somewhat favor the 

19 EPA's Power Plan Rule to Reduce Carbon Emissions. 

20 Our attorney general is on the wrong side 

21 of the Clean Power Plan. In fact, he should 

22 withdraw South Carolina as a plaintiff in the 
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1 federal lawsuit and instead follow in support of 

2 the EPA's Clean Power Plan. 

3 MS. DUNHAM: Thank you very much. Thank 

4 you both of you. 

5 Okay. I'd like to invite Samantha 

6 Lockhart to the table as well as Lindsey Moseley. 

7 Okay. Ms. Lockhart, when you're ready. 

8 MS. LOCKHART: All right. So, thank you 

9 for the opportunity to submit formal testimony 

10 regarding EPA's Federal Implementation Plan under 

11 the Clean Power Plan. 

12 My name is Samantha Lockhart, and 

13 I'm here today -- I'm from Arlington, Virginia. 

14 That's where I live, but I'm speaking on behalf 

15 of the National Wildlife Federation. And I'll 

16 just put in a caveat that I've been given this by 

17 our Policy Team to share some thoughts. They 

18 were not able to be here, so if you have follow19 up questions, I will note them but probably not 

20 be able to answer them. 

21 Because I strongly support the emissions 

22 reductions goals of the Clean Power Plan, I urge 
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1 EPA to only allow biomass to be used as a 

2 compliance option in the Federal Implementation 

3 Plan if it will quickly reduce net carbon 

4 emissions and if the biomass is harvested without 

5 damaging critical wildlife habitats. 

6 For states that do not create their 

7 own plans to cut carbon pollution from power 

8 plants, I commend the EPA for creating this 

9 backstop federal guaranty for reducing carbon 

10 pollution and protecting wildlife. The Federal 

11 Plan should be strong and aimed at protecting 

12 people and wildlife from power plant carbon 

13 pollution in order to ensure proper pollution 

14 reductions and to encourage wildlife-friendly 

15 renewable energy solutions. 

16 The proposed plan should be finalized in 

17 a timely manner so that states have time to use 

18 it to guide the formulation of their own plans. 

19 Biomass should be allowed as an eligible resource 

20 under the Federal Implementation Plan if it's use 

21 will clearly reduce atmospheric carbon levels in 

22 a policy relevant time frame. 
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1 The time frame under the Clean Power Plan 

2 that EPA has appropriately set for reducing 

3 carbon emissions is 2030. Accordingly, EPA 

4 should only allow the use of biomass under the 

5 FIP if its use can be clearly shown to reduce net 

6 carbon emissions by 2030. Most scientists and 

7 biomass experts agree that there are some biomass 

8 resources that will quickly reduce carbon like 

9 some crops or crop wastes, some federal 

10 harvesting residues, and food and forest 

11 processing wastes. Almost all states have a wide 

12 variety of such beneficial resources available at 

13 economically viable costs. 

14 However, numerous analyses have made it 

15 clear that there are many other forest-based 

16 biomass resources that will not reduce net carbon 

17 emissions by 2030, particularly trees that were 

18 they not harvested for energy, would continue 

19 growing for many decades. Burning such long 

20 rotation trees for energy will almost certainly 

21 increase atmospheric carbon levels for many 

22 decades directly undermining the purpose of the 
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1 Clean Power Plan. 

2 I urge EPA to not allow the harvesting 

3 and use of long-rotation forest products as 

4 biomass under the FIP. I also urge EPA to 

5 include strong sustainability provisions for all 

6 biomass allowed in the FIP. Harvesting crops and 

7 wood products can directly damage critical 

8 habitats for a wide variety of species of 

9 concern. EPA can set high sustainability 

10 standards for eligible biomass in ways that give 

11 states flexibility to meet them. Indeed, 

12 numerous states have already developed 

13 sustainability guidelines for the use of forest 

14 biomass, and EPA could acknowledge these 

15 guidelines as part of the ways that biomass 

16 sustainability is integrated into biomass use 

17 under the FIP. 

18 There are similar sustainability 

19 guidelines for the use of perennial herbaceous 

20 biomass, including ones that NWF developed for 

21 the Prairie Pothole Region or the Upper Midwest. 

22 In addition, we urge EPA to integrate 
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1 sustainable forest management certification as 

2 another means to demonstrate forest biomass 

3 sustainability. In particular, we applaud the 

4 EPA's recent decision to only recommend the 

5 Forest Stewardship Council as the only 

6 certification system federal -- federal 

7 purchasing. 

8 We believe that as the acreage of 

9 forestland under FSC certification increases, it 

10 could be used to demonstrate an increasing 

11 percentage of eligible biomass under the FIP. 

12 Thank you for the opportunity to comment 

13 today, and we look forward to working with you to 

14 finalize and implement the Clean Power Plan. We 

15 hope you will do everything you can to ensure it 

16 stays strong through the process. Wildlife and 

17 future generations are counting on your 

18 leadership. 

19 MS. DUNHAM: Thank you. I actually just 

20 -- not a -- ask a question for you to answer now 

21 but encourage to -- when you-all submit written 

22 comments to provide a little more on that Forest 
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1 Stewardship Council and some of the approach you 

2 took that you thought was a -- was a good 

3 approach to take with respect to certification. 

4 I think that would be helpful to us to get a 

5 little more information about that. 

6 MS. LOCKHART: Yes, absolutely. 

7 MS. DUNHAM: Thank you. 

8 MS. LOCKHART: Pass that along. Thank 

9 you. 

10 MS. DUNHAM: Ms. Moseley. 

11 MS. MOSELEY: Hi there. My name is 

12 Lindsey Moseley Alexander. It's M-O-S-E-L-E-Y, 

13 A-L-E-X-A-N-D-E-R. I'm the Assistant Vice14 President and National Health Air Campaign 

15 Director for the American Lung Association. EPA 

16 heard from some of my colleagues this morning. 

17 Today I am not here to testify on my own 

18 behalf or on behalf of the Lung Association but 

19 on behalf of Dr. Vijay Subramaniam. I think I 

20 got that right. Vijay Subramaniam. I volunteer 

21 with the American Lung Association in Virginia. 

22 He wanted to speak with you today but wasn't able 
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1 to make the trip, so I will now read his 

2 testimony to you in his own words. I brought a 

3 photo of him so that you can put this in his 

4 context. 

5 Hello, my name is Dr. Vijay Subramaniam, 

6 and I am a pulmonologist from Williamsburg, 

7 Virginia. I am also a member of the American 

8 Lung Association and Virginia's Leadership Board. 

9 I have been practicing pulmonary medicine in the 

10 Hampton Roads area for the last five years with 

11 significant environmental related lung disease, 

12 lung cancer, and COPD. 

13 I am participating to advocate for the 

14 health of my patients and testify in support of 

15 EPA adopting strong federal and model Clean Power 

16 Plans. Nearly 700,000 Virginians have asthma, 

17 and thousands more have other forms of chronic 

18 lung disease such as COPD and lung cancer. When 

19 exposed to unhealthy levels of air pollution such 

20 as ozone and particle pollution, these 

21 individuals are at an increased risk of 

22 experiencing symptoms. Because of the presence 
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1 of ozone and particle pollution in our breathing 

2 air is exacerbated by climate change, it makes 

3 combating the problem a public health imperative. 

4 If states nationwide adopt strong plans 

5 and put in the word now to make meaningful 

6 change, we have the ability to prevent up to 60 

7 -- I'm sorry -- 3,600 premature deaths, 90,000 

8 asthma attacks, and 300,000 missed days of school 

9 and work every year starting in 2030. The 

10 decisions made by EPA carry a tremendous weight, 

11 and it is important that they place public health 

12 first and foremost in their decision process. 

13 Growing up in the coal fields of West 

14 Virginia and training around the Pittsburgh steel 

15 mills I have been exposed to the poor air quality 

16 all my life. It was the norm to be coughing 

17 because you were trying to clear your lungs of 

18 all the particle pollution. 

19 The benefits for my patients, individuals 

20 who do not want to develop chronic lung disease 

21 in addition to the millions of other Americans 

22 with chronic lung diseases, will only come if 
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1 states develop strong mindful plans to meet the 

2 carbon reduction requirements set out by EPA. If 

3 states refuse to comply and attempt to deny their 

4 residents these lifesaving benefits, then it is 

5 up to EPA to provide a federal solution. 

6 As for those states who do plan on 

7 complying like Virginia, strong model plans will 

8 be a useful reference point. Model plans that 

9 encourage the adoption and improvement of energy 

10 efficiency incentives, initiatives, renewable 

11 energy sources, and thoughtful consideration of 

12 environmental justice issues will set a path to a 

13 healthier future here in Virginia and nationwide. 

14 I appreciate the opportunity to share my 

15 testimony and to advocate for my patients and for 

16 all Americans with chronic lung diseases. Thank 

17 you. 

18 MS. DUNHAM: Thank you very much. Thanks 

19 to both of you. 

20 I would now like to invite Laura Bender 

21 and Katie Huffling to the table. 

22 Okay. Ms. Bender, when you're ready. 
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1 MS. BENDER: Hi, my name is Laura Kate 

2 Bender, and I'm the Director of Advocacy for the 

3 American Lung Association's Healthy Air Campaign. 

4 Today, I, like my colleague just now am 

5 testifying on behalf of someone who wanted to 

6 make the trip in person but wasn't able. This is 

7 Dr. Erica Holloman. 

8 The American Lung Association in Virginia 

9 works closely with her to protect Virginian's 

10 health from dangerous air pollution. So I will 

11 read her testimony to you in her own words. And 

12 I also have a photo. 

13 Hello, my name is Dr. Erica Holloman, and 

14 I am the Project Coordinator for the Southeast 

15 CARE Coalition in Newport News, Virginia. The 

16 Southeast CARE Coalition is a broad community17 based partnership that specifically addresses 

18 environmental concerns in the southeast community 

19 of Newport News. The community that I serve, the 

20 low income minority voices of the southeast 

21 community is one of several environmental justice 

22 communities in the Hampton Roads region of 
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1 Virginia that continues to bear the burden of 

2 exposure to toxic pollutants and greenhouse gas 

3 emissions. 

4 As the mother of three young boys whose 

5 health is at risk from breathing dirty air, it is 

6 my duty to speak up when our decision makers have 

7 the opportunity to adopt clean air safeguards 

8 that are most protective of their health and the 

9 health of other vulnerable populations. 

10 So I am testifying in support of a strong 

11 Clean Power Plan not only here in Virginia but in 

12 all states. 

13 The Clean Power Plan is an essential 

14 clean air safeguard. It is a huge step forward 

15 in preventing premature deaths, asthma attacks, 

16 and missed days of work and school caused by poor 

17 air quality. In the southeast community 

18 residents in the predominantly African-American 

19 ZIP Code 23607 experience hospital discharge 

20 diagnoses for asthma that are disproportionately 

21 higher than the overall asthma discharge rates 

22 for the city of Newport News. In addition, 
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1 hospital admission rates related to asthma for 

2 younger adult residents of this ZIP code are 

3 significantly higher than state and national 

4 averages. 

5 These concerning trends in asthma-related 

6 incidents are not just seen in Newport News. In 

7 Detroit, Michigan, the African-Americans 

8 experience nearly four times as many asthma9 related hospitalizations as their white 

10 counterparts. In Newark, New Jersey, African11 American residents make more than seven times as 

12 many asthma-related visits as their white 

13 counterparts. All over the country there are 

14 communities that desperately need to see the 

15 health benefits of the Clean Power Plan. 

16 The Clean Power Plan is also an essential 

17 safeguard with regard to climate change impacts, 

18 especially in the Hampton Roads region of 

19 Virginia. The Hampton Roads region is the second 

20 most vulnerable region in the U.S. with regards 

21 to climate change impacts such as sea level rise 

22 and recurrent flooding. Within the region, my 
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1 community, the southeast community of Newport 

2 News, is one of the most socially vulnerable 

3 communities that will be impacted by these 

4 climate change impacts. 

5 In addition, climate change, fueled by 

6 carbon pollution increases the risk of 

7 experiencing dangerous levels of ozone pollution 

8 and particulate matter in the air that we 

9 breathe. These pollutants are known triggers of 

10 chronic lung disease, and for communities that 

11 already experience disproportionate rates of 

12 asthma-related hospitalizations, it's especially 

13 important that all available preventive steps are 

14 taken to protect their health. Hence, a strong 

15 plan is essential to the health and well being of 

16 my community and other environmental justice 

17 communities across the country. 

18 EPA must adopt strong federal and model 

19 plans that make addressing environmental justice 

20 a priority through, one, meaningful engagement 

21 with vulnerable populations; and two, expanding 

22 the EPA's environmental justice analysis. 
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1 The development of environmental justice 

2 advisory boards that are involved in writing and 

3 implementing the state's Clean Power Plan -- 

4 Compliance Plans is one way to ensure meaningful 

5 engagement. Mandating that states systematically 

6 consider how the option selected to implement the 

7 Clean Power Plan will impact -- directly or 

8 indirectly -- over really burdened communities 

9 like the southeast community I serve -- is 

10 critical. 

11 In addition to meaningful engagement with 

12 vulnerable populations and expansion of 

13 environmental justice analysis, EPA should 

14 encourage participating in the Clean Energy 

15 Incentive Program and their model plans. By 

16 encouraging participation in the Clean Energy 

17 Incentive Program, more low income communities 

18 could benefit from energy efficiency programs 

19 that will decrease their energy consumption and 

20 their energy bills. 

21 Thank you for your time, and I appreciate 

22 the opportunity to speak about how the health -- 
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1 the Clean Power Plan benefits health of residents 

2 of the southeast community. Thank you. 

3 MS. DUNHAM: Thank you very much. 

4 Ms. Huffling? 

5 MS. HUFFLING: Okay. Thank you. Good 

6 afternoon, and thank you for the opportunity to 

7 provide comments here today on this important 

8 public health standard. 

9 My name is Katie Huffling. It's 

10 H-U-F-F-L-I-N-G. And I'm also a nurse midwife 

11 here in the D.C. area. I also direct the 

12 Alliance of Nurses for Healthy Environments. 

13 We're the only national nursing organization that 

14 focuses solely on how the environment impacts 

15 human health. 

16 Today we are facing the greatest public 

17 health threat of our time -- climate change. 

18 Unless we take strong action today to quickly and 

19 substantially reduce our carbon pollution, this 

20 public health crisis is only going to worsen. 

21 As a nurse I feel it is my duty to 

22 protect those I serve from the devastating 
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1 impacts of climate change. And I am just one of 

2 Allegiance of Nurses who are voicing our support 

3 for strong climate action because we are on the 

4 front lines of climate change. We are caring for 

5 patients whose lives are deeply impacted by this 

6 problem, and their numbers will only continue to 

7 grow unless we take strong action against climate 

8 change now. 

9 Imagine having your two-year-old struggle 

10 to breathe because he went outside to play on a 

11 hot day when the smog levels are high. Or 

12 imagine you're a parent who's barely making ends 

13 meet, but you have to take an unpaid sick day 

14 because your child has to go to the emergency 

15 room with a severe asthma attack. Imagine your 

16 sister going into preterm labor because of an 

17 extreme heat wave. These are all scary real-life 

18 examples of how climate is already impacting 

19 those -- us in the U.S. today. 

20 Unfortunately, carbon pollution 

21 especially impacts low income communities and 

22 communities of color as a large proportion of 
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1 minorities live within 30 miles of a coal fired 

2 power plant. African-Americans and Latinos also 

3 make emergency room visits for asthma-related 

4 issues many times more often than whites. 

5 As a nurse and nurse midwife I have 

6 worked with many inner city patients, and I've 

7 seen these impacts firsthand. I've seen how on 

8 poor air quality days, which will only increase 

9 without climate action, my pregnant asthmatic 

10 patients would come into my office wheezing or 

11 report increased use of their inhalers. Having 

12 good control of asthma is an essential part of a 

13 health pregnancy as the mother's breaths are the 

14 baby's only source of oxygen. 

15 I would caution my pregnant patients to 

16 stay inside on poor air quality days since 

17 exposure to air pollution has been linked to poor 

18 pregnancy outcomes such as low birth weight. And 

19 low birth weight is not just a matter of the baby 

20 being born small; it's a serious condition that 

21 can lead to a lifetime of health problems and 

22 expenses. However, most women can't put their 
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1 lives on hold when there is a poor air quality 

2 day. 

3 Communities of color and low income 

4 communities are also more vulnerable to the other 

5 climate impacts such as heat waves and extreme 

6 weather. We've seen in many areas of the country 

7 deaths of elderly residents during heat waves 

8 because they didn't have access to air 

9 conditioning or couldn't afford to run their air 

10 conditioners. 

11 We've also seen how these communities 

12 have had difficulty during extreme weather events 

13 such as the issues of many in New Orleans during 

14 Hurricane Katrina who did not have the means to 

15 evacuate nor the funds to rebuild after the 

16 storm. 

17 Fortunately, there is something that we 

18 can do about these health disparities. And one 

19 of these is to support the Clean Power Plan. 

20 This public health standard is an excellent first 

21 step to addressing the public health impacts of 

22 climate change. 
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1 I, my fellow nurses, am encouraged by 

2 your estimates that by 2030 we'll be seeing 

3 significant health benefits such as preventing 

4 3,600 premature deaths, 1,700 heart attacks, 

5 90,000 asthma attacks, and over 300,000 missed 

6 days of school and work each year. 

7 Besides the reducing the pain and 

8 suffering caused by these health impacts, the 

9 health care cost reductions will be incredible. 

10 Just here in Maryland where I live, we spend over 

11 a billion dollars a year treating direct costs of 

12 asthma. And that's just one small state. When 

13 you think of all the different health conditions 

14 linked to climate change, the high levels of 

15 prevention seen with the Clean Power Plan have 

16 the potentials to significantly reduce health 

17 care costs here in the U.S. 

18 Nurses throughout the country are looking 

19 to their state officials to take a lead in 

20 protecting the health of their citizens and the 

21 effects of climate change by developing the 

22 strongest plans possible with the greatest 
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1 reductions in carbon pollution. 

2 We also voice our strong support for a 

3 strong federal plan for those states that don't 

4 take a lead. We can be leaders in addressing 

5 climate change, but we have to start now. Our 

6 children and future generations are depending on 

7 us. Thank you. 

8 MS. DUNHAM: Thank you very much. Thank 

9 you, both of you. 

10 Okay. I'd like to invite Charlotte 

11 Wallace and Earl Mitchell to the table, please. 

12 Okay. Ms. Wallace, when you're -- when 

13 you're ready. 

14 MS. WALLACE: Okay. Thank you for the 

15 opportunity to testify today. My name is 

16 Charlotte Wallace, C-H-A-R-L-O-T-T-E, last name 

17 Wallace, W-A-L-L-A-C-E. 

18 I'm a nurse, and I'm also an intern with 

19 the Alliance of Nurses for Healthy Environments. 

20 And, first of all, I want to thank you for your 

21 leadership in crafting the plan for the states 

22 that are not creating their own plans, but I'm 
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1 excited to watch the states become leaders in 

2 developing their plan for their own citizens and 

3 taking an active role in developing those plans. 

4 As a pediatric nurse for almost two 

5 decades, I have watched hundreds of children 

6 suffer with asthma as they struggle (inhale) for 

7 (inhale) each breath. They can't say a sentence. 

8 They're very sick. It's frightening for the 

9 child; it's frightening for the parents; and it's 

10 frightening to the medical staff. 

11 We're very fortunate to have great 

12 hospitals and amazing medicine to help the 

13 children. Unfortunately, sometimes we get the 

14 child too late, and the medicine doesn't work, 

15 and the children do die. 

16 One of the biggest -- oh, and far too 

17 many young people suffer from asthma and other 

18 respiratory illnesses related to preventable 

19 causes. One of the biggest and most preventable 

20 causes of asthma attacks and premature deaths are 

21 the harmful compound dumped into our air from 

22 power plants. Carbon pollution traps heat, and 
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1 air pollutants diminishes air quality and creates 

2 a threat to those struggling with respiratory 

3 disease. 

4 As you already know, while we have had 

5 public health safeguards against mercury, 

6 arsenic, and soot from power plants, there were 

7 no federal standards in place to protect the 

8 public from carbon pollution until your plan. 

9 Thank you for the Clean Power Plan. We 

10 need the plan to help us reduce our carbon 

11 pollution quickly and substantially in order ot 

12 protect public health from the impacts of climate 

13 change. 

14 As you know, the projects of 2030 -- I've 

15 heard them already stated. I won't restate them. 

16 But the numbers speak for themselves. The carbon 

17 pollution and the climate change -- it 

18 exasperates [sic] our far reaching public health 

19 threats that affect every living and breathing 

20 person in Maryland and across the country. But 

21 it affects some more than others, particularly 

22 minority, as you've heard, and lower income 
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1 communities, and especially children. 

2 Having worked at Johns Hopkins Hospital, 

3 I have seen firsthand how climate change 

4 disproportionately affects both minorities and 

5 children. Increased exposure to carbon pollution 

6 is especially dangerous to children of color -- 

7 as you've just heard -- who already have 

8 increased rates of asthma and are thus more 

9 susceptible to the dangers of air pollution. 

10 Carbon pollution has a disproportionate 

11 affect on children of all backgrounds. Children 

12 are not simply little adults. Their intake per 

13 pound, the infants intake per pound is twice that 

14 of an adult; and children's lungs are still 

15 developing. Inhaling power plant pollution, 

16 therefore, affects them significantly more than 

17 it does an adult. 

18 In addition, children often spend more 

19 time outdoors and in more active capacity than 

20 adults do, further increasing the amounts of 

21 pollution they inhale. Our children should be 

22 able to play outside without the risk of harming 
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1 their lungs. 

2 It is estimated that over 125,000 kids 

3 suffer from asthma in Maryland alone. And 

4 according to the Center for Disease Control 

5 Report, over 60 percent of children with asthma 

6 in Maryland have persistent severe asthma. A 

7 2013 MIT study showed that Maryland had the 

8 highest percentage of premature deaths related to 

9 the impact of polluted air in the country. In 

10 Baltimore, specifically, one out of every five 

11 children under the age of 18 years old have 

12 asthma. And this is twice the national average. 

13 With the Clean Power Plan you are doing 

14 your part to help protect public health, 

15 especially for the most vulnerable among us, 

16 including both children and minorities living in 

17 low income communities. 

18 Parents shouldn't have to worry about the 

19 air quality where their children live, learn, and 

20 play. The Clean Power Plan is a tremendous 

21 opportunity and responsibility to reduce the 

22 harmful carbon pollution that harms health and 
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1 worsens climate change. Our children deserve a 

2 chance to live a healthy and productive life. It 

3 is our responsibility to protect them from known 

4 harm. When it comes to carbon pollution, we have 

5 the means to do so. 

6 Thank you for your leadership. 

7 MS. DUNHAM: Thank you. 

8 Mr. Mitchell. 

9 MR. MITCHELL: My name is Earl Mitchell, 

10 and I live in Springfield, Virginia, and I'm a 

11 volunteer with the Sierra Club. 

12 You will probably hear some paid fossil 

13 fuel lobbyists today, and they will shout that 

14 the sky will fall if -- if the nation adopts the 

15 Clean Power Plan. Business as usual has given us 

16 five coal ash ponds at Possum Point, Virginia, 

17 which is less than 30 miles from where we sit. 

18 These ponds contain arsenic, lead, cadmium, 

19 mercury, et cetera, which -- which leak into the 

20 soil. Needless to say, this is harmful to all 

21 forms of life. These ponds date back to the 

22 1950's and now Dominion Energy is addressing the 
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1 issue. 

2 There are many more ponds in the state. 

3 Do you remember the one -- there are many more 

4 ponds in Virginia. Do you remember the one which 

5 leaked into the Dan River last year? It 

6 threatened the water supplies of Danville, 

7 Norfolk, and Virginia Beach. That one belonged 

8 to Duke Energy; however it caused Virginians many 

9 problems. 

10 Water withdrawals used to generate steam11 driven turbines in Virginia require 6 to 9 

12 million gallons of water per day. Much of the 

13 water is re circulated; however, much is lost 

14 through evaporation and leakage. Our 

15 southeastern water aquifer is not as depleted as 

16 those out west; however, it is dropping and water 

17 is too precious to waste. 

18 Much of our coal comes from the 

19 mountaintop removal which has polluted over 2,000 

20 miles of streams in Appalachia over the last 20 

21 years. These streams are now off limits for 

22 fishing and swimming. No matter how many 
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1 scrubbers are incorporated into the generating 

2 plants, coal was still a harmful fuel. The 

3 scrubbers merely capture some of the toxic 

4 material, but this material then must be safely 

5 disposed of. The harm starts with the mining of 

6 coal and continues with the coal ash which is the 

7 end product. 

8 Natural gas is not a cure-all. New York 

9 State has recently banned fracking, and Maryland 

10 has imposed a temporary ban. Which state is 

11 next? Fracking has been banned in Germany, 

12 France, the Netherlands, Scotland, and Wales. 

13 Dominion Energy is reconfiguring Cove Point in 

14 Maryland to facilitate the export of natural gas. 

15 The plan for it is -- is for more than 1.8 

16 billion cubic feet of gas per day to be exported. 

17 Much of that gas will come from fracking. That 

18 will constrict the supply here and increase 

19 domestic cost. 

20 Burning fossil fuels, both coal and 

21 natural gas, emit excess quantities of greenhouse 

22 gases needlessly. Enough of the past. 
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1 The University of Delaware Special 

2 Initiative on Offshore Wind, headed by Dr. 

3 McClellan, has released a study this year which 

4 predicts that Virginia could supply its entire 

5 electrical needs through offshore wind. A recent 

6 survey has indicated that 64 percent of 

7 Virginians are in favor of developing wind power. 

8 Rhode Island has taken the first step on 

9 the east coast with a wind farm that is now 50 

10 percent completed. Europe has been in the 

11 business for over two decades with many thousands 

12 of operating turbines. For information, the 

13 first modern utility-scale wind energy project 

14 started in 1931 in Europe. 

15 Virginia should closely examine the 

16 Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, RGGI, which 

17 is a carbon cap and trade project with the idea 

18 of joining that association. Nine states have 

19 collectively formed RGGI, and they have saved 

20 consumers more than $460 million over the past 

21 three years in lower electric bills. Our closest 

22 member state is Maryland. 
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1 Adopting clean energy would -- would 

2 improve the health of our citizens and would 

3 create many non polluting good jobs in every 

4 state. 

5 Stanford University, through its solution 

6 project, has estimated that Virginia could avoid 

7 1,300 premature deaths each year from air 

8 pollution by eliminating dirty fossil fuels. 

9 That number could be replicated in every state 

10 which relies on fossil fuels to generate power. 

11 In addition, Stanford's study has -- has 

12 projected that Virginia could have all its power 

13 needs supplied by renewable sources by the year 

14 2050. And, yes, I'm a Dominion Energy 

15 shareholder, and I like to get a good return on 

16 my investment. I also believe that Dominion 

17 could achieve a reasonable return by investing in 

18 renewable energy. 

19 If California, Iowa, South Dakota, 

20 Vermont, North Carolina, and many other states 

21 can do it, there's no reason why we can't do it 

22 throughout the United States. 
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1 A recent study by the Harvard School of 

2 Public Health has found that Virginia could be 

3 among the top 13 states nationwide in receiving 

4 public health gains from implementing the full 

5 CPP. 

6 We need to bring down our greenhouse gas 

7 emissions for the good of humanity. Start a 

8 phase out now of all coal burning facilities and 

9 impose a deadline of 10 years for all such 

10 facilities to be shut down. At the same time, 

11 take the tax breaks that the industry has 

12 enjoyed, and transfer those dollars to renewable 

13 energy industry. Thank you very much. 

14 MS. DUNHAM: Thank you very much. Thank 

15 you, both of you. 

16 Okay. I'd like to call Mary Anne Hitt to 

17 the table as well as Jim Doyle. 

18 Okay. Ms. Hitt, when you're ready. 

19 MS. HITT: All right. Good afternoon. 

20 My name is Mary Anne Hitt, M-A-R-Y -- space -- 

21 A-N-N-E, last name H-I-T-T. Thank you for the 

22 opportunity to testify. 
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1 I am the Director of the Beyond Coal 

2 Campaign at the Sierra Club. I live in West 

3 Virginia. And on behalf of the Sierra Club and 

4 our 2-plus million members and supporters I want 

5 to offer our support for the Clean Power Plan and 

6 for EPA's leadership in tackling climate change. 

7 During comment periods on the Clean Power 

8 Plan hundreds of thousands of our members have 

9 joined millions of Americans who weighed in with 

10 their personal support by submitting comments. 

11 Thousands have turned out to hearings, including 

12 those this month here and in Pittsburgh, Denver, 

13 Atlanta. And one poll after another has shown 

14 that Americans overwhelmingly support the Clean 

15 Power Plan and EPA action in reducing carbon 

16 pollution from coal plants, including recent 

17 surveys out of states like Missouri, Ohio, 

18 Virginia, and Illinois. 

19 So we applaud EPA's progress on the Clean 

20 Power Plan, and we will be submitting written 

21 technical comments. And I want to just provide a 

22 quick summary of some of our key requests 
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1 regarding the issues at hand today, the Federal 

2 Plan, the Clean Energy Incentive Program, and the 

3 Environmental Justice Analysis. 

4 We want to ensure that in the model 

5 federal plan that the standards achieve the 

6 pollution reductions promised in the Final Clean 

7 Power Plan and also address potential carbon 

8 pollution from new sources. We are encouraging 

9 EPA to finalize an adhere to a swift deadline for 

10 adopting and implementing the Federal Plan if 

11 states fail to act. We are encouraging EPA not 

12 to reward polluters by allocating allowances for 

13 free and hoping that any allowances will benefit 

14 low income communities and communities of color 

15 and other vulnerable communities. 

16 We're encouraging EPA in the Federal Plan 

17 not to reward dirty energy sources like biomass 

18 and waste to energy facilities. And we are 

19 encouraging EPA not to include a reliability set 

20 aside, as the rule is already very flexible and 

21 accommodating of reliability concerns. And we 

22 want to ensure that the renewable energy set 
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1 aside provides enough allowances to actually 

2 bring projects on line that wouldn't otherwise 

3 occur. 

4 For low income consumers we want to make 

5 sure that they benefit from the Clean Energy 

6 Incentive Program that it emphasizes and 

7 prioritizes projects that are in low income and 

8 vulnerable communities that would not otherwise 

9 be happening under a business as usual scenario. 

10 And on the Environmental Justice Analysis 

11 we want to ensure that the Model Federal Plan and 

12 the Environmental Justice Analysis all protect 

13 and benefit minority, low income, and indigenous 

14 communities. We are very appreciative that EPA 

15 included a Proximity Analysis that did indeed 

16 find that a higher percentage of low income 

17 communities and communities of color live near 

18 power plants, and we hope EPA will model co19 pollutants, that they will -- and that they will 

20 ensure that when they're applying the proposed 

21 Federal Plan to states that EPA is -- that EPA is 

22 ensuring that the pollution reductions are taking 
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1 place in overburdened communities. 

2 We would -- are hoping the finalized 

3 Federal Plan will ensure -- will include 

4 enforceable deadlines for EPA to address any 

5 localized emission increases that might result 

6 from the plan implementation and plans to 

7 mitigate any adverse impacts on communities, and 

8 we are hopefully that the finalized FIP will 

9 ensure vulnerable communities benefit from 

10 expansion of renewable energy and energy 

11 efficiency. 

12 We commend the EPA for outreach to 

13 vulnerable communities in preparing the plan and 

14 in the context of the proposed FIP, and we hope 

15 EPA will continue by aiming to respond to and 

16 address concerns raised by those communities 

17 about the Federal Plan. And when it issues a 

18 federal plan for a state. 

19 And so, with that I will share these as 

20 well, but I would like to conclude on a more 

21 personal note. 

22 I'm the mom of a 5-year-old, and I have 
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1 to travel a lot for work. And when I have to 

2 leave on yet another trip, one of the only things 

3 that makes my daughter feel better is knowing 

4 that her mommy is working very hard to take care 

5 of the planet. And she would be happy that that 

6 is what you are doing, too, in moving the Clean 

7 Power Plan forward, and so would all of the kids 

8 out there. 

9 Last Friday I was a few minutes away from 

10 booking yet another trip. This one was a plane 

11 ticket to Paris for events around the 

12 International Climate Negotiations. And I was 

13 minutes away from booking that ticket when the 

14 news broke about the terror attacks. And so I 

15 spent the weekend absorbing the news and the 

16 shock and thinking about whether I should go on 

17 the trip. 

18 And yesterday I went ahead and I booked 

19 the ticket. And what I'll be carrying with me is 

20 the progress this nation has made in reducing 

21 coal pollution, 184 new coal plants canceled, 205 

22 existing coal plants announced to retire, enough 
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1 clean and renewable energy coming online to 

2 replace them. I'll also be carrying with me the 

3 commitment that we, as a nation, are making to 

4 continue that shift to clean energy. And that is 

5 a commitment that we are making through the Clean 

6 Power Plan and through our advocacy and that of 

7 many others. 

8 And most importantly, I will be carrying 

9 with me the promise of a safe future for my 

10 daughter, a promise that we aren't giving up on 

11 building a safe world for her and for all of the 

12 kids of the world. We all know that the heart of 

13 the world is broken right now, but our future is 

14 in our hands. And if there was ever a time to 

15 stand up for that future and to stand up for a 

16 safe and healthy planet that can sustain us all, 

17 this is it. And that is what the Clean Power 

18 Plan represents. So, thank you. 

19 MS. DUNHAM: Thank you. Mr. Doyle. 

20 MR. DOYLE: My name is Jim Doyle, J-I-M, 

21 D-O-Y-L-E. I am President of Business Forward, 

22 which is a trade group here in Washington that 
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1 works with about 75,000 business leaders from 

2 across the country. Over the past year we've 

3 organized dozens of briefings on clean energy, 

4 energy security, and climate change across the 

5 U.S. Several thousand entrepreneurs, investors, 

6 small business owners, and senior executives have 

7 participated. Excuse me. 

8 Critics of the CPP argue that it will 

9 increase the cost of electricity which will cause 

10 manufacturers to shut down U.S. plants and move 

11 jobs to China. In order to judge this argument 

12 we have to understand just how much manufacturers 

13 spend on electricity and how much those costs 

14 would increase. 

15 Supporters of CPP argue that it's a 

16 necessary step to mitigating climate change. To 

17 judge this argument you have to understand just 

18 how much severe weather is costing manufacturers 

19 today. The answer is actually very simple. 

20 Electricity represents less than one 

21 percent of a manufacturer's total cost on 

22 average. EPA estimates -- estimates that 
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1 electricity rates could increase about 3.2 

2 percent in 2020. If one percent of your cost 

3 increased by 3.2 percent, that means your total 

4 cost increased by .032 percent. In other words, 

5 if you manufacture carburetors or toaster ovens, 

6 or anything and it cost you $100 per unit to 

7 manufacture that unit, your costs are going to 

8 increase 3 cents. 

9 We have talked to several thousand 

10 business leaders, and we have not found one that 

11 will shut down a lab, a factory, or an office 

12 because his or her costs are increasing by .032 

13 percent. 

14 On the other hand, we've talked to those 

15 business leaders, and they are very worried about 

16 what climate change is doing to their supply 

17 chain. Supply chain represents about 60 percent 

18 of a manufacturer's total cost. That's 60 times 

19 more than their electricity. 

20 Over the past four years those 

21 manufacturers have seen their supply chains 

22 disrupted by typhoons in Thailand, hurricanes in 
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1 the Gulf of Mexico, droughts in Texas, tornados 

2 in Kentucky, falling water levels across the 

3 Great Lakes, and flooding in the northeast. 

4 Cargo ships crossing the Great Lakes have carried 

5 less cargo to avoid running aground. Ports are 

6 preparing for more hurricanes. Highways and 

7 bridges are subject to more delays. Cargo trains 

8 have been disrupted by severe weather, have 

9 arrived at factories months behind schedule. 

10 Today these events are shutting down or 

11 slowing down plants for hours, days, sometimes 

12 weeks at a time. 

13 It's important to understand that this is 

14 actually quite new. Manufacturing plants of all 

15 industries have experienced about four unexpected 

16 disruptions each year on average for a total of 

17 about 20 hours of down time. These are typically 

18 caused by equipment failures, power outages, 

19 absence of key personnel, and severe weather. 

20 With the frequency and intensity of 

21 severe weather increasing, so are production 

22 delays and disruptions. An auto plant in Indiana 
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1 that rarely lost an hour of production lost four 

2 days in 2013 because of the Polar Vortex. 

3 Leading reporters have -- employers have 

4 begun reporting these risks to their 

5 stockholders. A consumer electronics 

6 manufacturer have described how the Thailand 

7 floods caused significant drops in computer -- 

8 excuse me -- computer sales that year. U.S. 

9 Steel has explained that low water levels in the 

10 Great Lakes are increasing shipping costs. Rails 

11 -- companies have explained that their cars are 

12 crossing Texas at lower speeds because the rails 

13 have warped due to this extreme heat and drought. 

14 And to really understand the context for 

15 this, it's important to understand that the -- 

16 the supply chains are growing increasingly big, 

17 increasingly complicated, and increasingly fast. 

18 It's called just in time inventory. And what it 

19 means is a plant operates with only a few hours 

20 of inventory on its shelves at any one time, 

21 helps reduce labor costs; it also helps reduce 

22 their overhead. And what that also means is that 
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1 if severe weather comes in and disrupts the plant 

2 -- if those parts are delayed two or three hours, 

3 that plant shuts down. So, the cost of these 

4 shut downs is much higher than a 3.2 percent 

5 increase in their electricity rates. 

6 An auto assembly plant loses 1.25 million 

7 dollars for every hour it shuts down. That means 

8 that a plant is going to lose more than 30 

9 minutes of severe weather reduced delays than it 

10 will pay in a year of higher electricity cost 

11 caused by the CPP. 

12 For those critics who are arguing that 

13 the CPP is going to kill manufacturing in 

14 America, we have to do the math. Nobody is 

15 closing a plant, or a lab, or an office because 

16 the cost of producing a hundred dollar product 

17 increases 3 cents. They should be looking at 

18 supply chain costs which are 60 times bigger and 

19 more important to their business. Thank you very 

20 much. 

21 MS. DUNHAM: Great. Thank you very much. 

22 Thanks to both of you. 
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1 So, I'm going to invite -- actually, I'm 

2 going to invite one more panel up here. So, 

3 could Felipe Floresca come to the table and Paul 

4 Kaplowitz. If you're both here, I'll invite you 

5 guys to the table. And then we're going to take 

6 a short break because a couple of us need a 

7 little bit of a break. So, is Felipe Floresca 

8 here? 

9 (No response.) 

10 No? Okay. Well, actually, is Susan 

11 Bonney here? 

12 (Indicating.) 

13 Okay. Okay. Great. Mr. Kaplowitz, when 

14 you're ready. 

15 DR. KAPLOWITZ: Hi, my name is Dr. Paul 

16 Kaplowitz, and I'm from Alexandria, Virginia. 

17 Thank you for this opportunity to offer comment. 

18 I am a member of the Virginia Sierra 

19 Club, and I'm here today to speak in support of 

20 the EPA's Clean Power Plan and to comment on the 

21 recently proposed Federal Implementation Plan. 

22 Fossil fuel fired power plants are a 
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1 major contributor not only to climate change but 

2 respiratory and heart disease as well. As a 

3 pediatrician I know that children are at the 

4 greatest health risk from air pollution because 

5 they're more likely to be active outdoors, and 

6 their lungs are still developing. 

7 I work at Children's National Medical 

8 Center a few miles from here where asthma, while 

9 treatable, remains a major cause of 

10 hospitalizations and ER visits. Asthma strikes 

11 nearly 1 in 10 school children in the U.S. and is 

12 the number one health issue that causes kids to 

13 miss school. 

14 By 2030 the Clean Air Power -- the Clean 

15 Power Plan, if it's implemented as planned, may 

16 prevent 150,000 asthma attacks, numerous 

17 hospitalizations, and ER visits, and up to 6,600 

18 premature deaths every year. 

19 This is really a personal issue for me 

20 and my family. Years ago my wife and I took our 

21 two young sons to several National Parks 

22 throughout the country, and even in the late 80's 
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1 and 90's it was clear that emissions from power 

2 plants were resulting in a haze which obscured 

3 any of the spectacular views which were much 

4 clearer when I visited those parks as a child. 

5 Now I have three grandchildren and a 

6 fourth is on the way. And it's really sad to 

7 reflect that without dramatic action the quality 

8 of the air and the warming of the climate will 

9 greatly affect the quality of their lives. 

10 Already, even this, you know, decade, we're 

11 seeing extreme weather events much more 

12 frequently than we did in the past. 

13 I want to leave behind a planet which my 

14 children and grandchildren can thrive in. And 

15 we're running out of time to halt the warming of 

16 the planet which is linked to rising CO2 levels. 

17 So, the EPA's Clean Power Plan won't 

18 solve all our problems, but I think at least it 

19 represents a strong first step and will show 

20 other countries that we are serious about 

21 mitigating global warming. 

22 It upsets me a great deal that those who 
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1 oppose this plan take the very narrow short-term 

2 view that this plan is an economic disaster which 

3 will result in loss of countless jobs. However, 

4 the Clean Power Plan provides great opportunities 

5 for economic growth and sustainable development. 

6 Investing in clean renewable energy will create 

7 jobs and fuel economic growth. And the EPA 

8 estimates that the Power Plan will deliver annual 

9 benefits as high as $93 billion a year by 2030 

10 which should more than offset the loss of jobs 

11 linked to dirty fossil fuels. 

12 There are good reasons for each state to 

13 develop its own plan that takes into account its 

14 own unique circumstances. Most states are likely 

15 to develop their own program to comply with the 

16 Clean Power Plan. The EPA can assist states by 

17 providing technical and policy guidance. It must 

18 also review and approve state plans to ensure 

19 that they comply with the Act. 

20 If a state fails to adopt and implement 

21 its inadequate plan, then the EPA is required to 

22 issue and enforce a Federal Implementation Plan. 
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1 And in order to ensure that the draft model 

2 Federal Plan is strong and just, here are some 

3 things that the EPA must do: 

4 First, it must assure -- ensure that 

5 carbon pollution standards in the Model Federal 

6 Plan achieve or surpass the pollution reductions 

7 promised in the Final Clean Power Plan. 

8 Second, we need to ensure that states 

9 address potential carbon pollution from not just 

10 old but new power plants to achieve overall 

11 electric sector reductions in carbon pollution. 

12 Third, we need to protect low income 

13 consumers by maximizing utilities' incentives to 

14 invest in energy efficiency which is good for the 

15 environment and lowers household energy bills, 

16 too. 

17 Fourth, we have to ensure that the Model 

18 Federal Plan protects and benefits minorities, 

19 low income, and indigenous communities that have 

20 traditionally borne the brunt of pollution from 

21 fossil fuels and may be most likely to experience 

22 the impact of final change -- of climate change. 
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1 And finally, the plan should resist give 

2 aways of allowances to the most polluting 

3 sources. Thank you very much. 

4 MS. DUNHAM: Thank you very much. Ms. 

5 Bonney. 

6 MS. BONNEY: Thank you. My name is Susan 

7 Bonney, S-U-S-A-N; Bonney is B-O-N-N-E-Y, and I'm 

8 a member also of the Virginia Sierra Club, and 

9 I'm in Fairfax County, Virginia. Our Sierra Club 

10 group is known as the Great Falls Group. 

11 I grew up in Virginia Beach, Virginia, 

12 and I’m here to comment on the CPP Federal 

13 Implementation Plan. My hometown, Virginia 

14 Beach, and the entire Hampton Roads region are at 

15 risk from sea level rise. This is a photograph 

16 taken last year of a neighborhood in Norfolk, 

17 Virginia, during a storm. It was not a 

18 hurricane. These streets are under water. Cars 

19 are in threat -- threatened of being under water 

20 also in this photo. The symbol -- the statue is 

21 a symbol of the City of Norfolk, Virginia, a 

22 mermaid. 
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1 Sea level rise in this region could 

2 eventually displace residents and business and 

3 threaten Naval Station Norfolk and other military 

4 and economic assets. The region has experienced 

5 two feet of sea level rise in 75 years and may 

6 face an additional two to five feet by the end of 

7 this century. 

8 Every year more of our dollars are going 

9 to addressing this impact of climate change. 

10 Rising sea levels raise the cost of keeping 

11 drinking water clean, and extreme weather hurts 

12 businesses that depend on tourism. That's a big 

13 economic driver in that -- in Virginia Beach. 

14 Hampton Roads is second only to New 

15 Orleans in its vulnerability to sea level rise 

16 impacts. 

17 But in response to this agency's search 

18 for input on the proposed Federal Plan, I urge 

19 you to put forth a strong Clean Energy Incentives 

20 Program for the states. The acronym, CEIP. The 

21 intent of the CEIP is to incentivize early 

22 investments in wind and solar, renewable energy 
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1 generation as well as energy efficiency measures 

2 implemented in low income communities. 

3 I will work and volunteer in Virginia to 

4 urge our leaders to participate in EPA's early 

5 action program to qualify for additional federal 

6 allowances and to benefit our low income 

7 environmental justice communities in both urban 

8 and rural areas. 

9 In order to ensure the draft model 

10 federal plan is strong and just, the Federal 

11 Implementation Plan must maximize utilities' 

12 incentives to invest in energy efficiency. 

13 Including these incentives will result in lower 

14 household electric consumption due to energy 

15 efficiency technologies in the -- that the FIP 

16 supports. The impact on low income families and 

17 all of us will be lower energy bills. 

18 A strong FIP will result in accelerated 

19 deployment of new renewable energy capacity which 

20 means a state will gain new renewable 

21 construction jobs. There's also a significant 

22 potential for energy efficiency-related job 
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1 creation. 

2 A strong FIP must also resist give aways 

3 of allowances to the most polluting sources of 

4 electricity generation. 

5 You, here at EPA, can emphasize in your 

6 communications to states and their leaders that 

7 because the matching federal allowances will come 

8 from a federal pool, it's the equivalent of the 

9 federal government providing matching grant funds 

10 for construction projects. Obtaining federal 

11 funding for construction projects will generate 

12 jobs and economic growth. And accordingly, it's 

13 in the states' best interest to maximize the 

14 opportunity for receiving the federal allowances 

15 which might otherwise go to other states. 

16 EPA has given states the flexibility to 

17 write their own state implementation plans. I 

18 plan to volunteer with many others to protect the 

19 CPP in Virginia so we do not forfeit the 

20 opportunity to cut carbon use now. 

21 I'm calling on EPA for a strong Federal 

22 Implementation Plan for any state that does not 
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1 submit an approvable plan. The Federal 

2 Implementation Plan must achieve the same levels 

3 of emissions performance as required of state 

4 plans under the CPP, or even better, even further 

5 reductions. Thank you for your time. 

6 MS. DUNHAM: Thank you very much. Thanks 

7 to both of you. 

8 All right. I would like to -- 

9 DR. KAPLOWITZ: Do you want a copy of our 

10 -- 

11 MS. DUNHAM: Yes, please. We love -- we 

12 can take it here or we can -- 

13 DR. KAPLOWITZ: Do you have any 

14 questions? 

15 MS. DUNHAM: Not today. Thank you. 

16 All right. We do want to take a short 

17 break. 

18 Thank you. We will submit that to the 

19 record. 

20 I want to take a short break, although, 

21 one -- before we do, I just want to make sure -- 

22 is Felipe Floresca here? 
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1 (Indicating.) 

2 Okay. Then why don't I invite you to -- 

3 if you're -- if you're ready, invite you up here, 

4 and then we'll -- we'll take a break when you're 

5 -- when you're done. 

6 So, yes, just -- I want to make sure 

7 people don't have to wait very long. So, 

8 Margaret Whiteside Cher, are you here as well? 

9 If you'd like to -- I'll invite you up here, and 

10 then you can come speak before we take a break. 

11 And then we'll take a break as soon as the two of 

12 you are done. 

13 All right. Mr. Floresca, as soon as 

14 you're ready. 

15 MR. FLORESCA: My name is Felipe 

16 Floresca. It's F-E-L-I-P-E; last name Floresca, 

17 F-L-O-R-E-S-C-A. And I work with the Emerald 

18 Cities Collaborative. 

19 The Collaborative would like to thank EPA 

20 for the opportunity to testify and submit our 

21 remarks for the record. 

22 The Clean Power Plan represents an 
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1 unprecedented opportunity to cut carbon pollution 

2 and address the health needs of all Americans. 

3 Our coal -- our collaboratives is a national 

4 intermediary organization promoting a clean 

5 energy economy, community resilience, and 

6 creation of high level jobs in low income 

7 communities of color. 

8 Our particular approach to the Clean 

9 Power Plan is, one, based on equity and inclusion 

10 to ensure that those communities are not left out 

11 of our nation's current clean energy revolution. 

12 We agree with a number of our fellow national 

13 advocacy organizations that climate 

14 disproportionately impacts low income communities 

15 of color. The Clean Power Plan not only 

16 addresses viable ways to address these impacts 

17 but also provides avenues to address the 

18 longstanding problems of poverty, unemployment, 

19 disinvestment, and blight. 

20 The Federal Implementation Plan should 

21 take full advantage of this opportunity by 

22 adopting policies that make long-term investments 
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1 in local economic development and jobs. 

2 Although we understand that CPP offers no 

3 silver bullet in alleviating these problems, it 

4 can take a concerted step towards addressing 

5 poverty and pollution. For us, equity translates 

6 into the development of policies that benefit all 

7 urban communities. As stated by our President, 

8 Dr. Denise Fairchild, in an April 2015 article in 

9 Governing magazine entitled, The Making of an 

10 Energy Ghetto, the clean energy revolution is 

11 underway and so is the war against it. For low 

12 income communities of color the stakes are 

13 especially high. Will these communities reap the 

14 benefits of the emerging clean energy economy, or 

15 will they be locked into energy ghettos? 

16 Similarly, in the summer of 2014 edition 

17 of the Harvard Law Review an article entitled, 

18 Addressing Poverty and Pollution, Vien Truong, 

19 who is Director of Green For All, stated that our 

20 ZIP codes have become a better determinant of our 

21 life expectancies rather than our genetic codes. 

22 These unequal health incomes directly relate to 
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1 toxic environments and social economic 

2 disparities. 

3 And in a recent governing article of last 

4 month on Racial Equity, Poverty and the Promise 

5 of Clean Power, ECC, our collaborative, joined 

6 the NAACP, Green Latinos, and the Asian Pacific 

7 Environmental Network to describe the negative 

8 impacts of carbon emissions on low income 

9 communities of color and how the Clean Power Plan 

10 can and must counter them. 

11 This article noted that communities are 

12 plagued with high rates of cancer, asthma, and 

13 other pollution-related illnesses well above the 

14 national average with 68 percent of African15 Americans and 40 percent of Latinos living within 

16 30 miles of a coal fired power plant. And over 

17 50 percent of Asian Pacific islanders living in 

18 counties with unhealthy air quality. 

19 Also, Latino and Asian Pacific immigrant 

20 communities living in the shadow of undocumented 

21 status have very limited medical options for 

22 pollution-related ailments. 
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1 Our Collaborative applauds EPP for 

2 including the Clean Energy Incentive Program in 

3 the Final Rule. CEIP addresses the energy 

4 disparities just described and could prevent 

5 energy ghettos by directing states to ensure that 

6 low income communities of color share in the 

7 benefits of the clean energy economy. By 

8 rewarding states for early investments in solar 

9 and wind generation as well as demand side energy 

10 efficiency programs, CEIP gives vulnerable 

11 communities the opportunity to generate wealth by 

12 turning property owners and communities into 

13 energy producers. 

14 CEIP offers unique opportunities to 

15 promote community ownership of energy resources 

16 and to create clean energy jobs for local 

17 residents. 

18 The FIP should include policy choices and 

19 flexible approaches that recognize equity as a 

20 major variable. This is essentially an important 

21 consideration how the value of pollution 

22 allowances is allocated. These allowances 
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1 represent an important tool to foster local 

2 economic development in communities of color. 

3 The allowance is created and revenues generated 

4 by the implementation of CPP should be used to 

5 guaranty not only environmental but economic 

6 benefits. 

7 For us, inclusion translates into 

8 guaranty -- guarantying that low income 

9 communities of color are engaged in development 

10 of state clean power plans. This is important 

11 because the states' plans can have a tremendous 

12 positive impact and effect on the health and well 

13 being of low income residents in vulnerable 

14 communities. 

15 But such opportunities will be lost if 

16 not -- if there is not inclusive engagement. ECC 

17 applauds EPA for requiring states to demonstrate 

18 through a clear public participation process how 

19 they are actively engaged in low income 

20 communities of color in state plans. 

21 This requirement is very, very meaningful 

22 for folks that we work with in 10 states. The 
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1 Final Rule recognizes that communities located in 

2 what we call Hot Spot Communities that live next 

3 to power plants must be addressed. 

4 We had two convenings, one last year in 

5 October and one two weeks ago, November 2nd; and 

6 we brought together 20 organizations to talk 

7 about equity and inclusion. 

8 The plan is a positive game changer for 

9 communities, and it provides a viable future for 

10 vulnerable folks around the country. 

11 Presently we are preparing formal 

12 comments on the Final Rule and the Federal 

13 Implementation Plan. We are also working with 

14 some of our advocacy allies on joint comments. 

15 Over the next two months we will continue to 

16 explore all aspects of the rule and the FIP. Our 

17 formal comments and those of our ally advocates 

18 will embody the principles of equity inclusion, 

19 and we will work and fight for SIP in California, 

20 Louisiana, Ohio, New York, Rhode Island, and 

21 Mississippi. 

22 Thank you for the opportunity to provide 
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1 this testimony and remarks to be submitted to the 

2 public record. 

3 MS. DUNHAM: Thank you very much. 

4 MR. FLORESCA: And sorry for going over 

5 time. 

6 MS. DUNHAM: No, that was good. Thank 

7 you. That's why it sets your -- okay. 

8 MS. CHEN: My name is Margaret W. Chen, 

9 C-H-E-N. Margaret, M-A-R-G-A-R-E-T. 

10 I live in Virginia. I'm a member of the 

11 Sierra Club, and I'm here as a volunteer. I am 

12 in favor of the EPA promptly issuing a Federal 

13 Implementation Plan if a state refuses to or 

14 cannot comply with the Clean Power Plan. 

15 Pollution reductions that will save lives 

16 and protect the planet from the most dangerous 

17 effects of climate change must -- we have to get 

18 them as early as possible. 

19 I'm originally from Kentucky. Every year 

20 I drive back there towards the Shenandoah Valley 

21 and then on through West Virginia. Part of the 

22 drive is breathtakingly beautiful and not all of 
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1 it is. We're on 64, and we go past the city of 

2 Nitro, West Virginia, and Ashland, Kentucky. 

3 This is part of the tri-state area that local 

4 residents call Chemical Valley. And you can bet 

5 we shut the car windows and close the vents as we 

6 drive through the area. We can still smell the 

7 air and see the smog. 

8 Oh, but they provide jobs for the locals, 

9 but jobs don't have to be those that produce 

10 pollution. Why not focus more on jobs that will 

11 produce cleaner energy or will use a new 

12 technology to clean up people's living 

13 environments? 

14 Soon enough, we pass through this area 

15 and come to the hills of western Kentucky and on 

16 into beautiful bluegrass country where it's easy 

17 to forget about the ugliness and the bad air. 

18 Out of sight, out of mind. But most of the 

19 weather systems move eastward which will bring 

20 the smog and particulate matter emitted by power 

21 plants to us, and it's easy to forget when you 

22 live away from the pollution. Maybe it's easy 
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1 not to care about poor and less advantaged people 

2 who may be stuck with living there, but the 

3 reality is that all of the smog and fine 

4 particulate matter cause environmental damage and 

5 have adverse consequences on everyone's health. 

6 Both of my own children suffered from 

7 asthma when they were young. And many times 

8 power plants are located near areas where 

9 minorities and disadvantaged lived, and their 

10 children typically suffer more from asthma and 

11 respiratory illness. 

12 So air pollution can be difficult to see, 

13 but if we're attentive, it can be observed 

14 directly. 

15 My husband and I sailed a small racing 

16 boat on the Potomac River many years ago. We 

17 kept it at Washington Sailing Marina, a few miles 

18 from the GenOn Power Plant in Alexandria. It's 

19 on the banks of the Potomac River. And every 

20 week we had to clean the black, tarry soot off of 

21 the fiberglass boat. It took car wax with its 

22 solvent to remove the tarry black specks that 
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1 adhered to the fiberglass. 

2 Smaller particles of that stuff can be 

3 carried to the far reaches by moving weather 

4 patterns. And it ends up in people's airways, 

5 causing asthma, lung cancer, other health-related 

6 illnesses. Someone pays the price because the 

7 power companies can't afford to. 

8 So, you probably know that the GenOn 

9 Power Plant has been closed, and clean up and 

10 environmental remediation has begun. Part of 

11 that closure was due to economic reasons, newer 

12 sources of energy, cleaner -- provide their own 

13 jobs, and they're not cost-free, but this closure 

14 is definitely a good thing for the people of the 

15 City of Alexandria where the ultra privileged and 

16 the working poor live side by side. 

17 When a power plant says the regulations 

18 are too difficult and will kill jobs, it's 

19 because they don't want to bear the extra cost. 

20 It will cut into profits, and they won't be able 

21 to compete. That's why it has to be a national 

22 mandate, and the EPA needs to get the 
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1 implementation plan into place. 

2 The true market economy has to take into 

3 account the true cost of energy production from 

4 start to finish, including cleaning up the 

5 environment. And if we all have to pay more for 

6 that energy, it means the economy before has not 

7 been properly accounting for the true cost of 

8 energy. 

9 So, today the energy industry has not 

10 taken a leadership role in conforming to the 

11 market economy principle. And only the 

12 government -- that is the EPA -- can induce this 

13 change by instituting more stringent regulations. 

14 Thank you for giving me the opportunity 

15 to speak today. 

16 MS. DUNHAM: Thank you very much. Thanks 

17 to both of you for speaking today. 

18 Okay. I think we are going to take a 

19 short break. It's about 3:42. Maybe we'll try 

20 to start up again at about 3:50, assuming we have 

21 people who want to talk. 

22 (Brief recess.) 
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1 MS. DUNHAM: Let me just check. Is 

2 Gavin Grossman here? Are you ready? Okay. If 

3 you're ready -- I don't want to rush you, and I 

4 want to make sure that our court reporter is 

5 ready, too. Okay. Then, Mr. Grossman, whenever 

6 you're ready. 

7 MR. GROSSMAN: All right. Well, first 

8 I'd like to thank the EPA, the Obama 

9 administration, and the President for moving 

10 forward with the Clean Power Plan. 

11 Limiting global pollution from power 

12 plants which are the single largest source of 

13 such pollution in the United States is a critical 

14 step to moving forward to protect our environment 

15 from the worst impacts of climate change. 

16 On behalf of Environment America I 

17 appreciate this opportunity to provide feedback 

18 on the draft model rule for states and the draft 

19 Federal Implementation Plan. Every day it 

20 becomes clearer that global warming is happening 

21 now, and it's already hitting us close to home. 

22 From drought in California to extreme rainfall in 
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1 South Carolina to historic flooding in Texas to 

2 extreme storms like what I've faced as a citizen 

3 from New Jersey with Super Storm Sandy. The 

4 signs that we need to urgently act are 

5 accelerating. This is why it's imperative that 

6 we implement the Clean Power Plan as quickly as 

7 possible and accelerate our transition to clean 

8 energy. 

9 We know that global warming is largely 

10 caused by carbon pollution. We should do 

11 everything in our power to invest in energy 

12 resources that do not contribute to global 

13 warming. States across the country have a vast 

14 potential to shift to clean energy. 

15 For example, America has the potential to 

16 power itself 10 times over with winds that blow 

17 both over land and off the east coast. States 

18 like Virginia and Georgia have extreme potential 

19 to develop offshore wind energy farms. And in 

20 states across the country like Colorado, there's 

21 -- who's already producing 10 percent of its 

22 electricity from wind, there's also great 
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1 potential. 

2 A great example of this would be the 

3 State of Iowa whose -- generates a quarter of 

4 their power using wind. The United States also 

5 has the potential to produce more than a hundred 

6 times as much electricity from solar PV and 

7 concentrating solar panels installations as the 

8 nation consumes each year. Each of the 50 states 

9 has a potential to generate more electricity from 

10 the sun than its residents consume. Colorado has 

11 enough solar power -- solar potential to power 

12 the entire state over 350 times over. Virginia 

13 could produce nearly 20 times as much power as it 

14 does through using solar energy. And Georgia 

15 could power its economy more than 40 times over 

16 using solar energy. 

17 Energy efficiency offers vast untapped 

18 potential to get more done while using less 

19 electricity. It's our cheapest and quickest tool 

20 to prevent global warming pollution. The 

21 American Council for Energy Efficient Economy 

22 estimates that we could reduce our overall energy 
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1 use across the economy by 40 to 60 percent by the 

2 year 2050. 

3 Even as our economy grows, by deploying 

4 better technology in our buildings, our industry, 

5 and our homes, it's important to invest in energy 

6 efficient programs. In order to address the 

7 climate crisis, we need to accelerate our 

8 progress towards a hundred percent clean energy. 

9 As the EPA finalizes the Model Rule and 

10 the Federal Implementation Plan, we strongly 

11 encourage you to ensure that these programs 

12 encourage investment in clean energy resources 

13 such as wind, solar, and energy efficiency as 

14 much as possible. 

15 I have a few specific recommendations on 

16 the proposed Model Rule and the Federal Plan. 

17 The faster the EPA can finalize the Model Rule, 

18 the more certainty states will have as they 

19 develop their compliance plans, and the quicker 

20 that they can move forward. 

21 We urge the EPA to consider whether some 

22 components can be finalized shortly after the 
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1 comment period closes. 

2 The EPA should apply the Federal Plan 

3 provision swiftly and should state -- and should 

4 a state decline to adequately carry out its 

5 responsibilities, we support the EPA's proposal 

6 to issue a federal plan for any state that does 

7 not meet one of the interim state planning 

8 milestones, and urge the EPA to do so within less 

9 than one year after finding that the state is not 

10 on track to submit a final state plan. 

11 Lastly, the EPA must ensure that the 

12 affected power plants abide by the enforceable 

13 limits on their emissions of global warming 

14 pollution by applying effective accountability 

15 mechanisms. 

16 Thank you again for the opportunity to 

17 speak. I appreciate the EPA's efforts in moving 

18 forward with our proposal, and I urge you to move 

19 forward swiftly in cleaning up our nation's power 

20 plants. 

21 MS. DUNHAM: Thank you very much. 

22 MR. GROSSMAN: Thank you. 
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1 MS. DUNHAM: Appreciate it. Okay. 

2 (Discussion off the record.) 

3 MS. DUNHAM: Let me just -- we also had 

4 Erica Wagner sign up earlier. Is Erica here? 

5 No, okay. 

6 Okay. I think we will -- we have at 

7 least one more person who is about to come in 

8 that we'll hear from, and we'll take anyone else 

9 who comes in, too. 

10 Ms. Friend, are you ready? Whenever 

11 you're ready, come -- 

12 MS. FRIEND: Hello, my name is Emma 

13 Friend, spelled E-M-M-A, F-R-I-E-N-D, and I am 

14 from Burlington, Vermont. Thank you for this 

15 opportunity to offer comment. 

16 I am an intern with the Sierra Club 

17 Legislative Office, and I am here today to speak 

18 in support of EPA's Clean Power Plan and comment 

19 on the recently proposed Federal Implementation 

20 Plan. 

21 I come to you today from Burlington, 

22 Vermont, the largest city in a state with a 
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1 historically notorious unfavorable job market and 

2 slow economic growth. Last year Burlington made 

3 headlines when it became one of the very first 

4 communities of its size to go to 100 percent 

5 renewable power in its energy mix, showing the 

6 rest of the country that it's possible and giving 

7 Vermonters the added benefit of economic growth. 

8 A boom in clean energy jobs has provided 

9 thousands of Vermonters with meaningful 

10 employment, put my state at number one for clean 

11 energy jobs per capita in the nation, and lowered 

12 utility costs for its residents. 

13 The connection between a shift to 

14 renewable energy from dirty oil and a boom in the 

15 state's economy is more than apparent. I only 

16 wish citizens of other states can reap some more 

17 benefits. And the Clean Power Plan is the way to 

18 do it. 

19 The Clean Power Plan provides great 

20 opportunities for economic growth and sustainable 

21 development. Investing in clean energy will 

22 create jobs and fuel economic growth, and 
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1 Burlington has proved that. In fact, the EPA 

2 estimates that the Clean Power Plan will deliver 

3 annual benefits nationwide of up to $93 billion 

4 by 2030. 

5 More than its small size, progressive 

6 policies, or slow economy, Vermont is perhaps 

7 best known for its natural beauty cultivated by 

8 but also inspiring an engrained culture of 

9 respect and reverence for nature. 

10 My best friend, Eeris [phonetic], moved 

11 there when she was 6 years old as a refugee from 

12 Bosnia. Bosnia has natural beauty she says but 

13 no respect for it. Littering is commonplace, and 

14 parks are few and far between. She visits Bosnia 

15 often, and when she returns, she is immediately 

16 struck by the difference in air quality. She 

17 says in her country between staggering 

18 unemployment rates and a lack of clean energy 

19 infrastructure fire stoves are still a main 

20 source of heat, and folks are known to supplement 

21 with whatever they can, including known 

22 carcinogens. Often without a filtration system, 
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1 this creates health problems for residents, 

2 including cancer and respiratory issues. 

3 My friend's family came to the U.S. for a 

4 better life, seeking asylum from a war-torn 

5 country. And yet many of these same devastating 

6 impacts of climate are felt in communities here 

7 in the U.S. from families displaced from their 

8 homes due to extreme weather to children 

9 suffering from the health impacts of poor air 

10 quality. 

11 Climate change is a human rights issue 

12 and one that must be dealt with immediately. The 

13 Clean Power Plan is a great place to start. For 

14 example, the EPA has estimated that by 2030 the 

15 Clean Power Plan will prevent 150,000 asthma 

16 attacks and up to 6,600 premature deaths 

17 annually. 

18 My state is already on a good track with 

19 an energy plan to reach 90 percent statewide 

20 renewable energy by 2050 and growth in clean 

21 energy jobs projected to double in the next 6 to 

22 12 months after a year of outperforming other job 
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1 sectors. There is every reason for each state to 

2 reap the same benefits. 

3 Under the Clean Power Plan EPA will 

4 assist state efforts by providing technical and 

5 policy guidance. EPA must also review and 

6 approve state plans to ensure that they comply 

7 with the act. If a state fails to adopt and 

8 implement an adequate plan, EPA is required to 

9 issue and enforce a Federal Implementation Plan. 

10 In order to ensure the draft model Federal Plan 

11 is strong and just, EPA must ensure the carbon 

12 pollution standards in the model federal plan, 

13 achieve the pollution reductions promised in the 

14 final Clean Power Plan or even further 

15 reductions, ensure that states address potential 

16 carbon pollution from new power plants to achieve 

17 overall electric sector reduction in carbon 

18 pollution, protect low income consumers by 

19 maximizing utilities' incentives to invest in 

20 energy efficiency which lowers household energy 

21 bills, ensure that the modern Federal Plan 

22 protects and benefits minority, low income, and 
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1 indigenous communities that have long borne the 

2 brunt of fossil fuel pollution and may be most 

3 likely to experience the impacts of climate 

4 change, resist give aways of allowances to the 

5 most polluting sources. 

6 The Clean Power Plan will clean up our 

7 air and address climate disruption while also 

8 modernizing how we power our country and our 

9 economy, spreading innovation and creating 

10 thousands of jobs and billions of dollars in new 

11 investments. Thank you. 

12 MS. DUNHAM: Thank you very much. 

13 Okay. I think we will wait for a little 

14 bit to see if -- if more people want to talk. 

15 If anyone here who has not talked would 

16 like to, I encourage you to check in at the 

17 registration desk outside. 

18 (Pause.) 

19 Maybe we'll -- we'll give it a couple 

20 minutes and then we might disband at least for 

21 the afternoon until the evening session, but 

22 let's give it a couple more minutes. 
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1 AUDIENCE: The others probably wouldn't 

2 get here till the last. 

3 MS. DUNHAM: Okay. Okay. Thank you. 

4 I think we can -- we'll take a break at 

5 least until more people come, but we'll -- okay. 

6 Yes, we'll -- we'll stay around for sure. 

7 (Pause.) 

8 MS. DUNHAM: Yes, thank you. 

9 AUDIENCE: I know there's at least one 

10 person, and they left. 

11 (Pause.) 

12 MR. NOVAK: Are you ready for me? 

13 MS. DUNHAM: Yes, sure, whenever you're 

14 ready. We're -- 

15 MS. MILLER: Impeccable timing. 

16 MR. NOVAK: Perfect timing. 

17 MS. DUNHAM: Okay. 

18 MR. NOVAK: How are you, Sarah? 

19 MS. DUNHAM: I'm good. 

20 MR. NOVAK: Good. Good afternoon. I'm 

21 John Novak, head of the Environmental Issues Team 

22 at the National Rural Electric Cooperative 
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1 Association. NRECA is a national service 

2 organization dedicated to representing the 

3 national interests of the more than 900 non-for4 profit rural electric utilities. The vast 

5 majority of NRECA members are consumer-owned 

6 cooperatives. 

7 In several instances EPA's final Clean 

8 Power Plan moved in the right direction by giving 

9 states more time to plan, pushing back the 

10 interim compliance deadline by two years, and 

11 eliminating the requirement for energy 

12 efficiency. 

13 Unfortunately, EPA also significantly 

14 increased the burden for many cooperatives and 

15 other utilities in states such as Montana, North 

16 Dakota, and Wyoming where the emissions reduction 

17 goals were increased by up to fourfold. EPA also 

18 did not adequately develop a reliability safety 

19 valve or solve the real problem of stranded 

20 assets or remaining useful life for cooperatives, 

21 thus the final Clean Power Plan will negatively 

22 impact electric cooperatives and their consumer 
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1 owners. 

2 Not surprisingly, EPA's proposed federal 

3 plan and model trading rules also fail to address 

4 the concerns that NRECA and our members have 

5 raised in comments in previous statements, and in 

6 meetings with EPA and others in the 

7 administration. 

8 Cooperatives and the consumer owners they 

9 serve will see substantial increases in 

10 electricity rates under the Clean Power Plan, 

11 whether under a state plan or the proposed 

12 Federal Plan. 

13 As we have pointed out before, electric 

14 cooperatives are heavily reliant on coal 

15 generation because they built coal fired power 

16 plants when the administration and the U.S. 

17 Congress encouraged the use of coal to provide 

18 affordable, reliable electricity. 

19 These coal units still have significant 

20 remaining useful lives as co-ops have spent 

21 billions of dollars on pollution control upgrades 

22 to these units to meet a host of EPA -- existing 
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1 EPA regulations. Many co-ops have outstanding 

2 loans, some government loans, that were necessary 

3 to pay for the environmental retrofits. Co-ops 

4 must be able to economically run these units to 

5 generate adequate revenue in order to repay these 

6 loans. 

7 EPA missed this point in the proposed 

8 Federal Plan by stating that units with short 

9 remaining useful lives will not have to incur 

10 significant capital costs for retrofit technology 

11 to comply. First of all, since there is no 

12 viable retrofit technology to reduce carbon 

13 dioxide emissions that exist in coal fired power 

14 plants, I'm not sure what technology EPA was 

15 referring to. 

16 Second, as EPA well knows, we're talking 

17 about units with significant remaining useful 

18 lives that are in jeopardy of being shut down 

19 because of the Clean Power Plan -- before the 

20 remaining debt can be paid off, resulting in 

21 stranded assets. 

22 The forced premature shut down of co-op 
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1 power plants before their debt is repaid means 

2 that co-op member owners will be paying twice for 

3 their electricity -- once for the shuttered power 

4 plant and again for power from somewhere else. 

5 And as you have heard before, many co-op consumer 

6 owners are among those who can least afford any 

7 increases in their electricity bill. 

8 EPA -- excuse me. NRECA questions EPA's 

9 assertion that the emissions trading provisions 

10 will provide sufficient flexibility to avoid 

11 premature shutdown of co-op owned coal units. 

12 Because of their small size and heavy reliance on 

13 coal, many co-ops will not be able to avail 

14 themselves of the flexibility in the proposed 

15 Federal Plan such as the option to run lower 

16 emitting natural gas generation instead of coal. 

17 EPA also points out that utilities have 

18 the flexibility to buy emissions allowances or 

19 credits under an emissions trading program. 

20 While we may question whether this will work 

21 effectively, there is no question that the price 

22 of buying allowances or credits will increase the 
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1 cost of electricity. 

2 NRECA seriously questions the view that 

3 the emissions trading market will ensure 

4 protection of reliability and that a dynamic 

5 reliability safety valve like the one put forward 

6 by NRECA is not needed. We don't believe the 

7 market would deliver enough emission-free 

8 electric generation to compensate for an 

9 unexpected electricity shortage should a large 

10 nuclear power plant, for example, suddenly go 

11 offline for an extended period of time. We 

12 strongly urge EPA to reconsider adding a dynamic 

13 reliability safety valve. 

14 Electric co-ops are at the forefront in 

15 the development of renewable energy such as 

16 community solar. Co-ops also have a long history 

17 of involvement in end-user energy efficiency 

18 programs. And co-op's carbon dioxide emissions 

19 are decreasing as they deploy more renewable 

20 energy and shift to lower emitting generation as 

21 their coal plants reach the end of their 

22 remaining useful lives and their remaining debt 
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1 is paid off. 

2 But the simple fact is that the Clean 

3 Power Plan and proposed Federal Plan don't give 

4 co-ops enough time to manage the transition to 

5 lower carbon dioxide emissions while continuing 

6 to provide affordable, reliable electricity to 

7 their consumer owners. 

8 And I greatly appreciate the opportunity 

9 to make this statement today; and that concludes 

10 my remarks. 

11 MS. DUNHAM: Thank you very much. I 

12 appreciate it. 

13 MR. NOVAK: Five minutes? 

14 MS. DUNHAM: That was perfect. 

15 MR. NOVAK: Thank you. 

16 MS. DUNHAM: Thank you. Okay. Is 

17 Juanita Constible here? 

18 MS. CONSTIBLE: Yes. 

19 MS. DUNHAM: I invite you to come to the 

20 table. 

21 MS. CONSTIBLE: Does it matter? 

22 MS. DUNHAM: It does not matter. 
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1 Whenever you're ready. 

2 MS. CONSTIBLE: Thank you. My name is 

3 Juanita Constible, J-U-A-N-I-T-A, 

4 C-O-N-S-T-I-B-L-E, and I really appreciate the 

5 opportunity to be here today. 

6 I've been working on climate change for 

7 almost a decade now. And the other night I was 

8 home reading yet another study talking about the 

9 impacts of climate change to human health, and my 

10 husband kind of peered over my shoulder and shook 

11 his head and said, aren't you sick of this by 

12 now; wouldn't you rather work on something more 

13 fun like butterflies? And he was joking, of 

14 course, but it would be nice to not have to deal 

15 with this. And we don't have that luxury. 

16 Pretending that climate change isn't happening 

17 would be like leaving our doors open in a high18 crime area and just walking away and assuming 

19 that we'll be safe. 

20 So that's not safe. That doesn't make 

21 sense, and that's why I really applaud your work 

22 to protect Americans and all of us from the 
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1 harmful effects of carbon pollution. 

2 It's important, however, that as you 

3 finalize the Clean Power Plan that you do it in a 

4 way that ensures -- ensure that all states meet 

5 their pollution reduction targets and maximize 

6 health benefits. So the Federal Plan and the 

7 Model Trading Rule should really create a 

8 framework that boosts new renewable energy and 

9 energy efficiency and minimizes new natural gas 

10 plants. 

11 As part of that, states -- EPA should 

12 clarify how states can show that their preferred 

13 approach to the Clean Power Plan will achieve the 

14 necessary cuts in carbon pollution. 

15 I also urge EPA to help states figure out 

16 how they can unlock the full potential of energy 

17 efficiency. So, for example, there is a huge 

18 carbon reduction opportunity in low income 

19 multifamily housing where investment in energy 

20 efficiency has historically been low. With the 

21 help of sufficient and appropriate guidance, 

22 states can use that existing technology to reduce 
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1 pollution in a cost effective way while also 

2 reducing energy costs for families. 

3 So my remarks are extremely short. I 

4 just want to applaud your work, urge you to stay 

5 strong as you're finalizing the plan, and thank 

6 you for efforts to protect all of us. Thanks. 

7 MS. DUNHAM: Thank you very much. 

8 Okay. I think we'll wait for a little 

9 bit until we get more people. 

10 Julie, would you like to testify? 

11 (Pause.) 

12 Okay. Thank you. We will officially 

13 adjourn for the afternoon and reconvene at 6:00 

14 p.m. this evening. Thank you. 

15 (Brief recess.) 

16 

17 

18 

19 

20 

21 

22 
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1 E V E N I N G S E S S I O N 

2 MR. CULLIGAN: Good evening. My name is 

3 Kevin Culligan, and I'm the Chair of this 

4 evening's session. 

5 Joining me are Jessica Gordon and Dan 

6 Schramm. 

7 And let me go through this: Fossil fuel 

8 fire power plants are the largest source of U.S. 

9 carbon dioxide emissions, accounting for 31 

10 percent of total U.S. total greenhouse gas 

11 emissions. Reducing carbon pollution from power 

12 plants is an essential step in lessening the 

13 impacts of climate change and providing a more 

14 certain future for our environment, our health, 

15 and future generations. 

16 We are here today to listen to your 

17 comments on the EPA's Proposed Federal Plan and 

18 Model Rules to implement the Clean Power Plan for 

19 existing power plants. 

20 On October 23rd, 2015, the Environmental 

21 Protection Agency published in the Federal 

22 Register its proposed Federal Plan to implement 
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1 emission guidelines for power plants under 

2 Section 111(d) of the Clean Air Act. The EPA's 

3 111(d) rule known as the Clean Power Plan takes 

4 effect on December 22nd, 2015 -- 2015, and 

5 applies to affected power plants that began 

6 construction on or before January 8th, 2014. 

7 The Federal Plan and Model Rule 

8 demonstrates a readily available path forward for 

9 Clean Power Plan implementation and present 

10 flexible, affordable implement all options for 

11 states. The Model Rules provide a cost effective 

12 pathway to adopt a trading system supported by 

13 EPA and makes it easy for states and power plants 

14 to use emissions trading. It does the heavy 

15 lifting for states who may choose to use a Model 

16 Rule as their state plan. The EPA would 

17 implement the Federal Plan in any state that does 

18 not submit an approvable plan. 

19 This proposal includes four discreet 

20 proposed actions: A rate-based federal plan for 

21 each state with affected EGUs; a mass-based 

22 federal plan for each state with affected EGUs; a 
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1 rate-based model trading rule for potential use 

2 by any state; and a mass-based model trading rule 

3 for potential use by any state. 

4 The Proposed Federal Plans will achieve 

5 the same level of emission performance as 

6 required of states under the Clean Power Plan. 

7 Federal plans will be finalized only for those 

8 states with affected EGUs that the EPA determines 

9 have failed to submit an approvable 111(d) State 

10 Plan by the relevant deadlines set forth in the 

11 Emission Guidelines. 

12 In those states where a federal plan may 

13 be required, a final federal plan will implement 

14 the same emission guidelines for affected power 

15 plants outlined in the Clean Power Plan. It 

16 would not require additional control requirements 

17 or impose additional costs. 

18 Even when a federal plan is put in place 

19 for a particular state, that state will still be 

20 able to submit a plan which, if approved, will 

21 allow the state and its sources to exit the 

22 federal plan. States may take delegation of 
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1 administrative aspects of the federal plan in 

2 order to become the primary implementer or submit 

3 partial state plans in order to take over the 

4 implementation of a portion of a federal plan. 

5 States operating under a federal plan may 

6 adopt complementary measures outside of the plan 

7 to facilitate compliance and lower costs to the 

8 benefit of power generators and consumers. 

9 This proposal also includes as a Model 

10 Rule for those states that are developing their 

11 own state plans. The EPA intends to finalize 

12 both the rate-based and mass-based model trading 

13 rules in the summer of 2016. A state program 

14 that adheres to the model trading rule provisions 

15 specified in this rulemaking, when final, would 

16 be presumptively approvable. 

17 There are standalone portions of the 

18 model trading rule such as the evaluation, 

19 measurement, and verification procedures for 

20 emission reduction credits, ERCs, that would be 

21 approvable even if a state adopted an approach 

22 that differs in other respects from the Model 
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1 Rule. 

2 In addition, the proposal contains a 

3 finding that it is necessary or appropriate to 

4 implement a Section 111(d) federal plan for 

5 affected EGUs located in Indian Country. CO2 

6 emission performance rates for these facilities 

7 were finalized in the Clean Power Plan. 

8 Information on how the EPA will reach out 

9 to communities throughout the comment period and 

10 an overview of the action that the EPA is taking 

11 to ensure that the vulnerable -- that vulnerable 

12 communities are not being disproportionately 

13 impacted by this rulemaking. 

14 If you would like more details on the 

15 proposed rule, there are fact sheets available at 

16 the registration desk. 

17 Before we get started, I'd like to go 

18 through a few housekeeping items and ground rules 

19 that will make today's hearing run smoothly. 

20 First, please be sure you have checked in 

21 at the registration desk even if you are not 

22 planning to speak today. And if you signed up to 
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1 speak online or by phone but haven't told us yet 

2 that you're here, please step out to the 

3 registration desk and let the EPA staff know that 

4 you have arrived. 

5 I will call speakers up in pairs. When 

6 your name is called, please come to the speakers' 

7 table at the front of the room. When I call on 

8 you to speak, please state your name and spell it 

9 for the court reporter. Your comments will be 

10 transcribed and included in the record of 

11 comments on the proposed rule. 

12 Each speaker will have five minutes to 

13 give comments. We have a timer light that will 

14 help you know how much time you have left to 

15 speak. When the light turns from green to 

16 yellow, that means you have one minute remaining. 

17 When it turns red, that's a signal that you're at 

18 five minutes, and it is time to stop. 

19 When you are finished speaking, please 

20 remain at the table until the person next to you 

21 has also completed his or her testimony. 

22 We are here to listen to you today, 
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1 however, a panel member may ask questions to 

2 clarify your comments. I will then call up the 

3 next pair of speakers and so on. 

4 If you have brought a written copy of 

5 your testimony, please give that to the staff at 

6 the registration desk before you leave today. 

7 We will put any -- I presume written 

8 comments -- written comments submitted today in 

9 the official docket for the proposed rule. We 

10 also have comment cards available at the 

11 registration desk if you would like to submit 

12 additional written comments today. 

13 If you want to comment in writing later, 

14 stop by the materials table near the registration 

15 desk and pick up a copy of the instructions for 

16 submitting written comments. Comments must be 

17 received by January 21st, 2016. 

18 Let me assure you the EPA gives as much 

19 consideration to comments that we receive in 

20 writing as we do to comments that we receive at 

21 public hearings like this one. So if you have 

22 more comments you would like to provide the EPA, 
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1 please submit them by -- please submit them by 

2 the comment period deadline. Your comments will 

3 be reviewed. 

4 If you have any questions during the day, 

5 please see the staff at the registration desk, 

6 and someone will assist you. 

7 Thanks again for taking the time today to 

8 share your comments on the EPA's proposal. And 

9 with that we will get started. 

10 So our first two speakers, we've got 

11 Robert Bingaman and Natalie Pier [sic], who I 

12 think was going to speak at 7:15, but it sounds 

13 like you're here now and -- and would be happy to 

14 speak. So if the two of you could come up. 

15 MR. BINGAMAN: Do you want to go first? 

16 MS. PIEN: Okay. 

17 MR. CULLIGAN: All right. So it sounds 

18 like you guys have agreed Natalie will go first. 

19 MS. PIEN: Okay. My name is Natalie 

20 Pien, N-A-T-A-L-I-E; Pien, P-I-E-N. And I live 

21 in Leesburg, Virginia. 

22 Thank you for the opportunity to share my 
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1 thoughts about the Clean Power Plan which I 

2 strongly support. The Clean Power Plan is the 

3 first nationwide step to address climate change. 

4 Because climate change affects me personally in 

5 several ways, I urge you to resist efforts to 

6 delay or weaken the plan. 

7 On a personal level I have loved ones 

8 that live in the Hampton Roads area. As you 

9 know, it is the second most vulnerable area to 

10 sea level rise. Next, in 2012 the Virginia coast 

11 was spared the wrath of Super Storm Sandy but 

12 luck cannot be dependent upon to safeguard my 

13 younger daughter and her grandparents. A strong 

14 Clean Power Plan can help protect them. 

15 Okay. These are my children. This is 

16 the younger one who's now in Norfolk. 

17 On a spiritual level, climate change is 

18 in direct with my belief system. You see, I'm a 

19 Unitarian Universalist and I am guided by UU's 

20 seven principles. Climate change violates two 

21 principles, the second and the -- second and the 

22 seventh principle. 
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1 The second principle affirms and promotes 

2 justice, equity and compassion in human 

3 relations. The poor in our country and across 

4 the globe are disproportionately affected by 

5 extreme weather that now occur at greater 

6 frequency due to climate change. 

7 Those most greatly impacted by climate 

8 change have contributed the least to it. Climate 

9 change promotes injustice and inequity. 

10 The Unitarian seventh principle respects 

11 the interdependent web of all existence of which 

12 we are a part. The World Wildlife Fund reports 

13 that human induced global warming has already 

14 caused the extinction of two species of frogs in 

15 Costa Rica. In addition, irreversible changes to 

16 ecosystems are occurring. Coral reef leaching is 

17 just one example. Climate change disrupts the 

18 interdependent web of life. 

19 Not only is climate change a challenge to 

20 my spirituality, it is also a challenge to my 

21 morality. Climate change is a moral issue that 

22 the Pope Francis that has so eloquently described 
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1 so many times in so many different ways. 

2 While targeting the causes of climate 

3 change in a technical manner, the Clean Power 

4 Plan also addresses the moral issue. 

5 Okay. This is a picture of my church, 

6 the Unitarian Universal Church of Loudoun. It's 

7 a historic structure built by freed slaves from 

8 the Owens Plantation in Leesburg, Virginia. And 

9 out front you can see prayer flags that were 

10 created by children at a festival in Leesburg, 

11 and we hung them after the Pope's visit. 

12 On a professional level climate change 

13 undoes my careers as a former environmental 

14 planner and a current public school teacher. 

15 Like all teachers I am preparing my students to 

16 realize their dreams and become productive 

17 citizens. That won't matter if today's students 

18 struggle to survive in a world made unlivable by 

19 climate change. 

20 Okay. This is my Ecology Club. We're 

21 planting a rain garden on our school grounds to 

22 try to improve the water quality of the runoff 
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1 from our school. 

2 Here are students releasing trout 

3 fingerlings that were raised from eggs to 

4 fingerlings for about six months at the school 

5 and released into a natural trout stream. 

6 Our world is not doomed to being hostile 

7 to life on earth. Today we have the technology 

8 to meet our energy and power needs in a safe and 

9 sustainable way through the development of 

10 renewables -- solar, wind, water, and geothermal. 

11 Please don't include biomass. 

12 The Solutions Project, based on research 

13 by Stanford University Professor Mark Jacobson, 

14 shows how each state in the nation can transition 

15 to 100 percent renewable energy. In addition to 

16 eliminating greenhouse gas emissions, additional 

17 benefits are reaped, including long-term job 

18 creation, avoided mortality and illness costs, 

19 plus energy and climate cost savings for every 

20 citizen. 

21 Here is a visual summary of the Virginia 

22 analysis. 
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1 In addition Public Citizen just released, 

2 on November 16th, its Clean Power Clear Savings 

3 Report which demonstrates that the EPA power plan 

4 can cut electricity bills in every state. 

5 The Clean Power Plan pushes our country 

6 towards a more rapid transition from the planet 

7 destroying fossil-fuel-based economy to a 

8 sustainable renewable resource-based economy. 

9 The plan must be implemented without delay. The 

10 window to avoid runaway climate global warming 

11 and unmitigated climate change is rapidly closing 

12 at a rate quicker than previously thought. 

13 Climate change is real. The effects are 

14 observed worldwide. A global climate change 

15 treaty is desperately needed. The Paris Climate 

16 Talks are just around the corner. The U.S. needs 

17 a strong leader -- needs to show strong 

18 leadership and credibility in Paris. The Clean 

19 Power Plan does just that. Thank you. 

20 MR. CULLIGAN: Thank you. And thanks for 

21 taking the time to drive all the way out here to 

22 comment in person. 
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1 And, Robert Bingaman? 

2 MR. BINGAMAN: Hi, my name's Robert 

3 Bingaman. That's B-I-N-G-A-M-A-N. I live in 

4 Takoma Park, and I am the National Organizing 

5 Director for the Sierra Club. 

6 I'm sure you've heard a lot of statistics 

7 today, and I'm going to spare you those. I think 

8 I want to start by telling the story about why I 

9 work at the Sierra Club and the path that led me 

10 here tonight. 

11 Twenty some years ago when I got offered 

12 the job at the Sierra Club, myself and my partner 

13 Marybeth and I did what many couples do faced 

14 with that kind of decision is we put together the 

15 pluses and deltas list of taking the job. And 

16 over the course of the weekend we had several 

17 conversations about whether or not I should take 

18 this job. And one of those conversations took 

19 place on a Sunday afternoon as we were driving 

20 somewhere with our two kids in the back seat of 

21 our car. 

22 My oldest son Timothy was 9 years old at 
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1 the time. And as Marybeth and I were talking 

2 through the pluses and deltas, this little voice 

3 came from the back seat of the car. He said, 

4 okay, Dad, stop. He said, tell me what the 

5 Sierra Club is. And I tried to describe how 

6 Sierra Club engages people to take action to 

7 protect the environment and protect their 

8 communities. 

9 He asked me what the job entailed. Or he 

10 said, what do they want you to do was the 

11 question he asked me. So I tried to describe to 

12 him the job. 

13 And at that point there was silence in 

14 the back seat. I was driving, and I looked in 

15 the rearview mirror, and I could see little 

16 wheels turning in a 9-year-old's head. And I 

17 said, Timothy, what are you thinking. 

18 Timothy said, Dad, you have no choice. 

19 You have to take this job. I want to raise my 

20 kids on a healthy -- in a healthy planet. 

21 That's what motivates me in this work, 

22 and that's why I'm such a strong supporter of the 
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1 Clean Power Plan. 

2 The Clean Power Plan will help ensure 

3 safe and healthy communities for children like 

4 Timothy who is no longer 9 years old but 22 years 

5 later is 31 years old. 

6 There's three points that I just want to 

7 make really briefly. Again, I want to restate 

8 that I'm here to strongly support aggressive 

9 implementation of a strong and just Clean Power 

10 Plan. And as my job at the Sierra Club has taken 

11 me, it's been my pleasure to help give voice and 

12 have people raise their voice in support of the 

13 Clean Power Plan. I think every single poll you 

14 look at -- Republican, Democrat, and across the 

15 board -- supports the federal government taking 

16 strong action to curb carbon pollution. 

17 The Clean Power Plan is important to me 

18 because it does protect communities. It will 

19 protect the lives and health of our citizens. 

20 It -- it also ensures that impacted 

21 community members are engaged in the planning 

22 process and the decisions about how this gets 
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1 implemented, and I really hope the states do take 

2 seriously their obligation to plan in the state. 

3 It also ensures a just transition for the 

4 workers in those communities that will be 

5 displaced as coal plants come offline, and it 

6 will lead us to a clean energy future and 

7 diminish the damage of carbon pollution. 

8 Second point I want to make about the 

9 Federal Implementation Plan I already stated 

10 while I hope states will take bold action to 

11 implement the Clean Power Plan, cut pollution, 

12 create green jobs, and move us towards a clean 

13 energy economy, I'm not naïve enough to think 

14 that all states will. So I really want to urge 

15 the EPA to be fearless in ensuring strong plans 

16 get implemented in every state. I hope that you 

17 are fearless in using your federal authority in 

18 states that are refusing to act. 

19 Finally, I want to thank the 

20 Environmental Protection Agency and the President 

21 of the United States for promulgating the Clean 

22 Power Plan which, again, protects our 
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1 communities, families, and children like Timothy. 

2 Just, finally, I want to restate one -- 

3 on last time my strong support for a just and 

4 strong Clean Power Plan and the implementation. 

5 Thank you very much. 

6 MR. CULLIGAN: Thank you. Thank both of 

7 you for your comments. 

8 All right. It looks like we have two 

9 more speakers. We've got Emmanuel Newman and 

10 Arthur Barkman. 

11 So, unless you guys object, Emmanuel 

12 first. 

13 MR. NEWMAN: Emmanuel. 

14 MR. CULLIGAN: Emmanuel. 

15 MR. NEWMAN: Good evening. My name is 

16 Emmanuel Newman, E-M-M-A-N-U-E-L; last name 

17 N-E-W-M-A-N. And I am a legal intern at We Act 

18 for Environmental Justice in the D.C. office. We 

19 Act for Environmental Justice is a New York 

20 community-based organization whose mission is to 

21 build healthy communities by assuring that people 

22 of color as well as low income communities 
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1 participate meaningfully in the creation of sound 

2 and fair environmental health and environmental 

3 protection policies and practices. 

4 Over the last 27 years We Act for 

5 Environmental Justice has worked tirelessly to 

6 empower, educate, and engage our communities in 

7 policy advocacy at the local, state, and federal 

8 levels. On behalf of the entire environmental 

9 justice community I want to thank you for this 

10 opportunity to be part of the brainstorming 

11 process and, hopefully, our suggestions and 

12 recommendations go a long way to help shape 

13 greater environmental policies for the well 

14 being of all mankind. 

15 We support the Clean Power Plan for all 

16 the protections it affords, but there are a few 

17 concerns that we would like to address, but for 

18 the sake of time I will just limit myself to two 

19 of those concerns. 

20 First one is the set asides, and the 

21 second one is the ready to receive. This first 

22 -- I'll first address set asides. We Act 
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1 recommends a clear roadmap as to how the set 

2 asides will be managed. Definitions and criteria 

3 for these set asides should be done in concert 

4 with low carbon state environmental justice 

5 organizations. Yes, a portion of this set aside 

6 should be targeted to renewable energy projects 

7 that benefit low income communities. 

8 How should a low income community be 

9 defined for set asides for the Clean Energy 

10 Incentive Program? The definition of low income 

11 would be state or region specific. The existing 

12 definitions of eligibility crafted by federal 

13 agencies to implement different programs, 

14 particularly housing, community development, and 

15 weatherizations across the country. Definitions 

16 should not conflict with the ones used by 

17 existing federal programs and should be carefully 

18 crafted to ensure that both urban and community 

19 -- and rural communities can benefit from the 

20 program. 

21 For example, some already defined 

22 populations that might fit into the definition of 
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1 low income are, one, stakeholders that already 

2 receive supplemental security income or Aid to 

3 Families and Dependent Children, children and 

4 families that have been diagnosed with severe 

5 respiratory concerns, children and families that 

6 reside in multifamily units or public housing as 

7 well as children and families living in rural 

8 areas that experience high energy costs or low 

9 energy reliability, or any other criteria that 

10 the state in collaboration with environmental 

11 justice organizations within their state see as 

12 reasonable -- as reasonable criteria. All these 

13 populations fit into the definition of low 

14 income. 

15 How much of these set asides should be 

16 designated and targeted at overburdened 

17 communities? And we are to believe that that 

18 percentage should be determined by the percentage 

19 of people that are defined as overly burdened by 

20 the environmental justice analysis. 

21 Also, states should be required to 

22 participate in the Clean Energy Incentive Program 
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1 as a condition of approval of a state plan or a 

2 state allocation within the Federal 

3 Implementation Plan. 

4 The second thing I want to talk about is 

5 the ready to receive. And we are -- we suggest 

6 that the ready to receive funds can be used to 

7 make homes ready to receive. Oftentimes 

8 weatherization and energy efficient measures 

9 cannot be implemented or cannot be completed on 

10 the homes of low income energy users because 

11 there are health and concerns in the homes. 

12 So what we believe is that the -- these 

13 funds that would be given to the -- to the 

14 clients can be -- can be used to help them bring 

15 their homes to the level of ready to receive so 

16 they can receive because they do not have the 

17 financial means to bring their homes to the level 

18 of ready to receive, so their homes are not ready 

19 to receive. 

20 We have -- we believe that if we're able 

21 to use that, it would help lower income 

22 communities to be able to prepare themselves for 
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1 the ready to receive. 

2 I have a few more points, but I know my 

3 time is up, so I would thank you very much. 

4 MR. CULLIGAN: So it sounds like you'll 

5 be either leaving those comments or submitting 

6 more detailed written comments with -- with 

7 additional points? 

8 MR. NEWMAN: Yes, yes, we have written 

9 comments that my boss, Dr. Jalonne White-Newsome, 

10 has forwarded. And the other colleagues of mine 

11 who will be here to -- to give other points that 

12 we -- we want to get addressed. 

13 MR. CULLIGAN: Great. And you mentioned 

14 specifically on the definition of low income 

15 community giving states a fair amount of -- of 

16 flexibility in how they define it? 

17 MR. NEWMAN: I'm sorry? 

18 MR. CULLIGAN: Are you giving the states 

19 some latitude in how they define low income? 

20 MR. NEWMAN: Yes, because -- because 

21 depending on which state in which they are and 

22 the cost of living and the standard of living, 
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1 low income in one area may not be low income in 

2 another area and vice versa. So we think it 

3 should be -- it should be states -- locally 

4 specific. 

5 MR. CULLIGAN: Do your -- will the 

6 comments go into any more depth on sort of -- 

7 MR. NEWMAN: Absolutely. 

8 MR. CULLIGAN: -- you know, are there -- 

9 are there like criteria or minimum guidelines or 

10 -- or -- 

11 MR. NEWMAN: Yes, like I mentioned, I 

12 mentioned these four -- these four points that 

13 have -- have already been used to define low 

14 income by federal agencies. So, these -- these 

15 four are some of the definitions of low income 

16 that federal agencies have used, and we want -- 

17 we want to continue with those definitions of low 

18 income. 

19 MR. CULLIGAN: Great. Thank you. 

20 MR. SCHRAMM: Yes, I had -- I had a 

21 question. Thanks. 

22 You were using a term ready -- the 
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1 households being ready -- ready to receive? 

2 MR. NEWMAN: Correct. 

3 MR. SCHRAMM: Is that -- could you 

4 explain what that term means? 

5 MR. NEWMAN: Ready to receive for 

6 localities -- what -- what happens is for them to 

7 be able to benefit from energy efficient 

8 programs, their homes have to meet certain 

9 minimum standards. Maybe roof not leaking or 

10 sewage leakage and so for them to be able to get 

11 access to those funds, they have to bring their 

12 homes to a certain minimum level. And because of 

13 the fact that they are low income, they are 

14 unable to afford to make those changes to bring 

15 their homes to the minimum standard of ready to 

16 receive. 

17 So, what we are asking for is to help 

18 with financing them to be able to make -- use 

19 some of the funds to support those low income 

20 groups or low income communities to bring their 

21 homes up to ready to receive standards. 

22 MR. SCHRAMM: Okay. 
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1 MR. CULLIGAN: Thank you. 

2 MR. NEWMAN: Thank you very much. 

3 MR. CULLIGAN: And, Arthur? 

4 MR. BARKMAN: Yes. Good evening. My 

5 name is Arthur Barkman I am a member of the 

6 Washington, D.C., Sierra Club, a resident of the 

7 District of Columbia, and a recent graduate of 

8 the George Washington University. I am here 

9 today to speak in support of the Environmental 

10 Protection Agency's Clean Power Plan and comment 

11 on the recently proposed Federal Implementation 

12 Plan. 

13 In August of this year President Obama 

14 and the EPA finalized the Clean Power Plan, 

15 creating historic safeguards to protect our air, 

16 our water, our climate, and the health of our 

17 communities. 

18 The Clean Power -- the Clean Air Act 

19 directs the EPA to set national air standards 

20 which include the standards for carbon pollution 

21 from fossil fuel power plants. The Clean Power 

22 Plan achieves this by providing state governments 
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1 the opportunity to take the first steps toward 

2 developing and implementing emission standards to 

3 limit carbon pollution in their states and to do 

4 so with a plan tailored to local conditions. 

5 Fossil fuel power plants are one of the 

6 largest sources of greenhouse gases and a major 

7 contributor to climate change. It is estimated 

8 that carbon emissions from power plants represent 

9 40 percent of the total CO2 emissions in the 

10 United States. 

11 In addition to carbon the plants also 

12 emit conventional and toxic air pollutants into 

13 the atmosphere. While studying developmental and 

14 environmental economics at GW, I learned that no 

15 one is more affected by climate change and carbon 

16 emissions than poor and low income families both 

17 in the United States and around the world. 

18 The emissions mentioned above directly 

19 contribute to respiratory and heart diseases but 

20 also indirectly when climate change increases the 

21 range of ticks and mosquitoes which spread 

22 illnesses such as Lyme Disease and West Nile 
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1 Virus. The poor are less able to deal with these 

2 illnesses given their limited resources and 

3 access to medical attention. 

4 The extreme weather events, sea level 

5 rise, and hotter, more drought prone climate are 

6 also detrimental for low income families as they 

7 lack resources to either adapt or relocate to 

8 avoid the significant changes that are taking 

9 place. 

10 They may also be more adversely affected 

11 by crop failures and property loss due to 

12 drought, flooding, and other climate events due 

13 to a lack of insurance. 

14 By regulating fossil fuel power plants, 

15 the Clean Power Plan will lead to significant 

16 climate and public health benefits for all. The 

17 EPA has estimated by 2030 the Clean Power Plan 

18 will prevent up to 150,000 asthma attacks and 

19 33,000 -- excuse me, 3,300 heart attacks 

20 annually. In addition, the Clean Power Plan 

21 provides a number of opportunities for economic 

22 growth and sustainable development. The 
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1 investments in clean renewable energy will create 

2 jobs and fuel economic growth in our country. It 

3 is estimated that the plan will deliver annual 

4 benefits of $93 billion by 2030. 

5 The Clean Power Plan will create a 

6 cleaner environment for our families and help to 

7 address climate change and improve the situation 

8 of the poor and low income families most affected 

9 by climate change. It will modernize how we 

10 power our country and economy, encourage 

11 innovation, and create thousands of new jobs and 

12 billions of dollars in investments. 

13 I urge the Obama administration and the 

14 EPA to continue their work in ensuring the health 

15 and well being of Americans and the environment. 

16 Thank you. 

17 MR. CULLIGAN: Thank you. I thank both 

18 of your. 

19 MR. NEWMAN: Thank you. 

20 MR. CULLIGAN: All right. And our next 

21 two speakers are Shantha Ready Alonso and Phillip 

22 Collins. 
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1 Would you like to go first, Shantha? 

2 MS. ALONSO: Sure. So, I'm Shantha Ready 

3 Alonso. First name S-H-A-N as in Nancy-T-H-A; 

4 Ready like the word; Alonso, A-L-O-N-S-O. And 

5 I'm with Creation Justice Ministries. So, I'm 

6 the Executive Director of Creation Justice 

7 Ministries. We bring together 38 Christian 

8 denominations on Care for Creation issues. And 

9 almost all of our denominations at some point in 

10 their life have made statements about Care for 

11 Creation or specifically the moral mandates to 

12 abate climate change. 

13 So, we believe the Clean Power Plan is an 

14 important tool to let out the ideals that are 

15 reflected in those faith statements that our 

16 member denominations have made. And all along 

17 the way in the crafting of the Clean Power Plan 

18 our membership has been very active in the 

19 stakeholder meetings and testifying at things 

20 like this to make sure that the Clean Power Plan 

21 continues to reflect our values. 

22 So, these statements will be somewhat at 
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1 the 50-foot level but they are values that we 

2 want to make sure continue to be in this Federal 

3 Implementation Plan that you're working on. 

4 So the four main ones that we want to see 

5 are stewardship, sustainability, sufficiency, and 

6 justice. 

7 For stewardship we're coming at it from 

8 an understanding that creation belongs to God and 

9 not us. We're stewards and not owners, and, 

10 therefore, we have a responsibility to be 

11 caretakers of all creatures, the climate, our 

12 air, our water, and our entire natural world. 

13 So we ask you to take this opportunity to 

14 preserve and protect creation for future 

15 generations and, therefore, we ask you to steward 

16 the resources available to us in a responsible 

17 and safe manner. Please minimize the harmful 

18 impacts of energy development on land, air, and 

19 water. 

20 Whenever possible we ask that the Federal 

21 Implementation Plan encourage renewable energy 

22 systems that renew and replenish the earth and 
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1 all that's in it. We ask that you follow the 

2 recommendations of the best available science to 

3 abate climate change, reduce greenhouse gases, 

4 and stabilize our global temperatures. Those are 

5 our stewardship requests. 

6 Second is sustainability. Our faith 

7 calls us to ensure that the systems that we 

8 create today will serve the generations that are 

9 coming tomorrow. So we would like you to plan 

10 now that the efforts to reduce carbon emissions 

11 empower further initiatives in the future to 

12 improve our air and mitigate the effects of 

13 climate change. 

14 We ask you to foster sustainable energy 

15 use by individuals, organizations, corporations, 

16 and communities, invest in modernizing our energy 

17 infrastructure to create a reliable and efficient 

18 grid that will stand the test of time, and 

19 support policies that incentivize forward 

20 thinking innovations to create sustainable 

21 technologies that are clean and renewable. 

22 Third, sufficiency. Our Christian faith 
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1 calls us to gratitude for what God has given us 

2 and calls us away from the idolatry of Mammon, 

3 the false god of greed. Following God and non 

4 Mammon means that we have to shift how we use and 

5 share, both as individuals and as states, God's 

6 gifts of energy and air. We cannot achieve 

7 significant reductions in emissions without a 

8 change in our lifestyle and fossil fuel 

9 consumption or else we're deluding ourselves if 

10 we think we can keep consuming at the rate that 

11 we have been. 

12 So we ask you to encourage conservation 

13 both in our homes, communities, and businesses as 

14 well as for utility companies to find ways to 

15 conserve energy in the production and 

16 distribution of power. Part of this could be 

17 done from technology. Part of it is just about 

18 using less. 

19 Last and most important to us is justice 

20 and equity. As Christians we believe that all 

21 people are children of God who deserve to 

22 equitably share in God's abundant gifts, yet the 
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1 burden of climate change, air pollution, and 

2 energy inequity falls disproportionately on 

3 people living in poverty, communities of color, 

4 and our children. 

5 It is immoral to build our energy 

6 infrastructure on the agony and death of our 

7 neighbors, and Christian communities will not 

8 remain silent as energy infrastructure continues 

9 to cause us to lose lives and create injustice. 

10 So we ask that the Federal Implementation Plan 

11 eliminate disproportionate health impacts from 

12 pollution on marginalized communities, include 

13 mechanisms to ensure worker justice. 

14 We want to see just transitions from the 

15 carbon intensive industries to clean energy and 

16 jobs. We want to ensure utility companies don't 

17 unduly transfer costs of upgrading to cleaner 

18 energy sources to consumers to include provisions 

19 for low income households; and we'd like to make 

20 sure that vulnerable communities have access to 

21 persevering and responding to disasters. That 

22 has to be in the plan. It can't be an 
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1 afterthought. And the churches usually end up 

2 cleaning up those messes. 

3 So I'll close with a quote from one 

4 of the signers of one of the most recent 

5 Christian statements that came out on climate 

6 change that specifically pertain to the Clean 

7 Power Plan. It was released by black church 

8 climate change leaders. And one of the signers 

9 of that statement was Bishop Carroll Baltimore. 

10 And he gave a testimony about why this personally 

11 matters to him. African Americans are 

12 significantly more susceptible to asthma. 

13 He said, I have asthma. My father has 

14 asthma. My son has asthma. My grandchildren 

15 have asthma. We're trying to keep breathing. I 

16 have this drive inside of me, and now I have this 

17 adorable little great grandson, and I'm concerned 

18 about the planet that I'm leaving for him. I 

19 want a world where he can breathe free, and we're 

20 all just trying to keep breathing. So let's 

21 create a world of stewardship sustainability, 

22 sufficiency, and justice. And then we'll all be 
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1 able to take in life-giving breath of God, clean 

2 air, and breathe free. Thank you. 

3 MR. CULLIGAN: Thank you. And Phillip. 

4 MR. COLLINS: Hi, my name is Phillip 

5 Collins, P-H-I-L-L-I-P, C-O-L-L-I-N-S. I'm an 

6 attorney in Washington, a local attorney. I've 

7 been in the local Superior Court, for example, 

8 child abuse cases and other things. And I have 

9 been in Washington since '85, came -- when I was 

10 young in high school, I bicycled across the 

11 United States from L.A. to Portland, Oregon, and 

12 back to New Jersey where I grew up. 

13 And of course, New Jersey, as you know, 

14 is a waterfront state. We were pretty low level 

15 near the water table in tidal areas in New Jersey 

16 where we had a farm there. So, that was an 

17 issue. You know, when the water rises, New 

18 Jersey's going to be one of the states that 

19 suffers from that if -- I'm talking about the 

20 climate and Clean Power Plan from a climate 

21 change and global warming perspective in that -- 

22 in that respect. 
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1 And, of course, D.C. is not immune to 

2 that. We have now, for example, the East Potomac 

3 Park gets under water from time to time. You 

4 know, particularly when you have a spring flood 

5 and then you also have a tide or an extra special 

6 high tide coming in. And global waters have been 

7 rising and they could rise again, particularly 

8 with Greenland and South -- and Antarctica and 

9 the glaciers around the world have been melting 

10 particularly -- now, for example, I went on the 

11 -- as a bicyclist -- when I said I bicycled 

12 across the country, I also have bicycled to high 

13 school. 

14 I bicycled home from college in New York 

15 -- Ithaca, New York back to near Philadelphia. I 

16 bicycle for commuting in the D.C. area and so the 

17 -- that's -- you know, that's one way to stop 

18 climate change which you're going to be breathing 

19 anyway, so you might as well do something with 

20 while you're -- while you're -- while you're --

21 breathing and get somewhere at the same time. 

22 And also, it saves a gym membership and things. 
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1 But in New Jersey I had a relative there 

2 who was -- dug water wells, and then later he got 

3 into ground source heat pumps. You put a hole in 

4 the ground and run water through it, and you can 

5 heat and cool -- both heat and cool a building 

6 that way. And, of course, it works better if you 

7 insulate, but what I'm saying is that the power 

8 that we're getting from these -- well, sources 

9 that are not clean could be replaced with cleaner 

10 sources and still do the job and also not just do 

11 the -- the job but give people jobs as well so 

12 that we wouldn't necessarily have to displace 

13 workers long term. There would be a transition, 

14 of course; but it's something that I've 

15 experienced. 

16 Now I haven't had anybody in my family 

17 with -- that I know of -- with asthma or other 

18 things, but obviously that's an issue for some 

19 people. And my grandfather came from Poland 

20 early 1900's, and he was briefly up in the mines 

21 in the Scranton area before he came down to 

22 Philadelphia, so he never got black lung, but, 
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1 you know, that's another issue, too, with some of 

2 the mines that are underground. And there's 

3 other issues with the above mine -- aboveground 

4 mines, and there's issues with fracking. There's 

5 issues with getting oil. So, I mean we can avoid 

6 a lot of these issues if we move to a cleaner -- 

7 cleaner plan. 

8 Now obviously we're not talking at -- 

9 entirely about getting off at this time, although 

10 we are talking about a transition to getting to a 

11 cleaner power which may entail getting off of 

12 fossil fuels entirely at some point both for the 

13 cleanliness of it in terms of the air that we 

14 breathe and also in terms of the climate. 

15 And so, I'm trying to do my part at home 

16 also. And when I've lived alone, for example, 

17 I've let the temperature get down to as low as 40 

18 degrees inside. So, having been a Boy Scout with 

19 a troop that camped in New Jersey throughout the 

20 winter, I was somewhat used to that also. When I 

21 visit my grandparents, we -- I stayed up in the 

22 attic which was unheated, and I got used to that. 
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1 And people can get used to that type of thing, 

2 even -- even inside. So I mean, like when you 

3 wash off, you don't wash your whole body, you 

4 just wash, like, one arm and then we'll dry it 

5 off and then do the other. There's -- there's 

6 ways that we could adopt if people wanted to. 

7 Now I talked to a guy, Bill -- Bill 

8 McKibben about what people could do in terms of 

9 that, and he says, well, you'll probably only get 

10 about 3 or 4 percent of people who would be 

11 willing to do something like that; but, you know, 

12 3 or 4 percent would help, and it would also set 

13 a -- make it more acceptable perhaps and also put 

14 a ground -- ground basis of some wisdom or 

15 knowledge of how to do that if we had ever came 

16 to the point that we actually ran out of fuel. 

17 Some of these -- the fuels, such as the 

18 dirty ones, are ones which are actually depleting 

19 compared to the cleaner ones which don't -- don't 

20 deplete. I mean, we're going to -- well, I don't 

21 know when. I don't know who knows when, but some 

22 day they're going to run out of commercial 
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1 availability. 

2 You know, Pennsylvania used to set -- 

3 when my grandfather was in the coal mines 

4 briefly, used to set the standard for oil. 

5 That's where the first coal mines were. And then 

6 -- then Texas. Well, they're -- you know, 

7 they're running out of fuels there. And even -- 

8 even the tar stands, they're supposed to be very 

9 big, but eventually they're going to run out, so 

10 we need to do something else there, too, before 

11 we -- as well as clean up our air. Thanks. 

12 MR. CULLIGAN: Thank both of you for your 

13 -- for your time. 

14 And it looks like we have one more 

15 speaker. Jacqueline Gallant. 

16 MS. GALLANT: Hi, so do I spell my name? 

17 It's J-A-C-Q-U-E-L-I-N-E, Gallant, G-A-L-L-A-N-T. 

18 Hi, my name is Jacqueline Gallant, and 

19 I'm a D.C. resident. Thank you for this 

20 opportunity to offer a comment. I'm here today 

21 to speak in support of the EPA's Clean Power Plan 

22 and comment on the recently proposed Federal 
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1 Implementation Plan. 

2 Like many Americans, I have asthma. And 

3 like many Americans, I have an inhaler to treat 

4 that asthma. Recently the plastic chamber that 

5 connects to the inhaler and disburses the 

6 medication cracked. So that's this part right 

7 here (indicating). Given that it was simply a 

8 tiny piece of plastic, I assumed it would be very 

9 easy to replace. I was wrong. It's not covered 

10 by insurance. The plastic chamber, not the 

11 inhaler, just the plastic chamber costs around 

12 $40 to replace, and it wasn't covered by 

13 insurance. Although it was undeniably 

14 frustrating to pay around $40 for a piece of 

15 plastic, I was fortunate enough to be able to pay 

16 for it. This is not the case for everyone. For 

17 someone living paycheck to paycheck or for a 

18 single mother struggling to make ends meet, $40 

19 for a tiny piece of plastic is a serious economic 

20 burden. And when you have asthma, not purchasing 

21 an inhaler or a part for your inhaler isn't an 

22 option. 
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1 Carbon pollution and climate change, 

2 among their many consequences, exacerbate asthma 

3 and other respiratory health problems. Fossil 

4 fuel fired power plants are a significant source 

5 of the carbon pollution that drives climate 

6 change and exacerbates health problems like 

7 asthma. They pose a particularly significant 

8 problem for low income communities where many 

9 fossil fuel fired plants are located. As 

10 residents often cannot afford to treat the health 

11 problems they develop from carbon pollution, 

12 unregulated fossil fuel fired plants don't just 

13 degrade the environment; they pose a major public 

14 health crisis and economic burden for communities 

15 across the United States. 

16 The communities that bear the 

17 consequences of carbon pollution don't just need 

18 the Clean Power Plan; they deserve it. If 

19 properly implemented, the Clean Power Plan is 

20 predicted to prevent an estimated 150,000 asthma 

21 attacks and up to 6,600 premature deaths annually 

22 by 2030. 
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1 In addition to its many health benefits, 

2 the Clean Power Plan will contribute to 

3 sustainable economic growth and help mitigate the 

4 potentially dangerous impacts of climate change. 

5 The host of economic and health benefits derived 

6 from the Clean Power Plan can join at being 

7 implemented correctly. In order for this to 

8 occur I urge the EPA to, one, ensure the carbon 

9 pollution standards in the Model Federal Plan 

10 achieve the pollution reductions promised in the 

11 final Clean Power Plan or even further 

12 reductions. 

13 Two, ensure that states address potential 

14 carbon pollution from new power plants to achieve 

15 overall electric sector reductions in carbon 

16 pollution. 

17 Three, protect low income consumers by 

18 maximizing utilities' incentives and invest in 

19 energy efficiency which lowers household energy 

20 bills. 

21 Four, ensure that the Model Federal Plan 

22 protects and benefits minority, low income, and 
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1 indigenous communities that have long borne the 

2 brunt of fossil fuel pollution and may be most 

3 likely to experience the impacts of climate 

4 change. 

5 And, five, resist give aways of 

6 allowances to the most polluting sources. 

7 The choice is simple. Without the Clean 

8 Power Plan, we're one big step closer to living 

9 in a destabilized climate that burdens everyone, 

10 in a climate in which individuals like me will 

11 struggle with intensified asthma and other health 

12 problems. With the Clean Power Plan we reduce 

13 carbon pollution and spur a sustainable growth. 

14 In one scenario Americans, especially 

15 Americans who are most vulnerable to the effects 

16 of climate change, disproportionately lose. In 

17 the other scenario Americans of diverse 

18 backgrounds reap an array of short and long-term 

19 benefits. 

20 I strongly urge you to choose the winning 

21 scenario and support your robust implementation 

22 of the Clean Power Plan. Thank you. 
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1 MR. CULLIGAN: Thank you very much. 

2 Thank you. And our next speaker is Max Broad. 

3 Go ahead when you're ready. 

4 MR. BROAD: Great. Thank you. Thanks 

5 for having me. 

6 Would you like me to spell -- spell my 

7 name? Okay. Max Broad. That's M-A-X, 

8 B-R-O-A-D and its pronunciation. I am -- 

9 MR. CULLIGAN: I think it might -- might 

10 be the only one I've gotten right so far. 

11 MR. BROAD: You nailed it. 

12 I am a D.C. resident and a D.C. Sierra 

13 Club member. And I'm -- I'm here today -- I want 

14 to comment on the Clean Power Plan because I have 

15 a real interest in seeing this happen. 

16 My -- my appeal for the U.S. taking 

17 action on climate dates back to travels in 

18 Mexico, ironically. I was out of the country, 

19 and I had come across -- I was in Michoacán, 

20 Mexico, and I had come across this -- you know, 

21 this land where everybody turned off the lights 

22 wherever they went, and they all had CFL light 
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1 bulbs installed, and everybody had a passive2 solar water heater tank on top of their rooftop. 

3 And to me this was a real beacon of -- of energy 

4 efficiency and conservation that I hadn't seen in 

5 the United States. 

6 I mean, imagine going onto a rooftop and 

7 seeing every rooftop collecting a -- collecting 

8 the sun's -- the sun's heat passively. To this 

9 was -- this wasn't -- this wasn't what I was 

10 expecting in Mexico. This was what I was 

11 expecting in the United States 20 years from now. 

12 And this was back in 2007. 

13 It -- it opened my eyes to something. It 

14 made me realize that no matter what measures 

15 Mexico was going to take or what measures 

16 Guatemala, or Honduras, or Tajikistan, or 

17 Pakistan, or Never Never Land was going to take, 

18 it didn't matter as long as the U.S. didn't act 

19 on climate. 

20 And that's why I've come to -- come here 

21 to support the Clean Power Plan. For me, the 

22 Clean Power Plan isn't just about reducing 
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1 emissions to protect endangered species and 

2 protect other -- the forests and other aspects of 

3 the environment. For me, the Clean Power Plan is 

4 about preventing real economic harm to -- to 

5 Americans and people of the world and, in 

6 particular, the impoverished who suffer from 

7 climate change disproportionately more than -- 

8 than average people like myself. 

9 And when I say suffer, I mean that 

10 currently. We're -- we're already seeing the 

11 impacts of climate change. 

12 Now, because I want to see the Clean 

13 Power Plan go through, I do have one -- one key 

14 feature that I'd like to present. And that is 

15 the -- the aspect of creating a carbon price 

16 within the Clean Power Plan. I -- that's very 

17 important for an aspect of link -- creating 

18 linkages between states. 

19 And the reason why I feel passionately 

20 about that is looking forward 20 -- 20 years, I 

21 see the Clean Power Plan in the future and -- and 

22 thinking not only of what it should be but what 
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1 it will be, the Clean Power Plan is -- can be 

2 this opportunity where everything's linked 

3 together. Everything's an effective market with 

4 many states all partnering together as part of 

5 one unified national system. A price on carbon 

6 is a key mechanism for doing that. 

7 With that being said, I want to say that 

8 the Clean Power Plan is a meaningful part of my 

9 identity as an American. The Clean Power Plan 

10 makes me proud to be an American. Thank you. 

11 MR. CULLIGAN: Thank you. So, I -- at 

12 this point we don't have anyone else here to 

13 speak. If you are here, you haven't spoken, 

14 you're on -- on the fence about talking, now 

15 would be an awesome time because there's nobody 

16 on line. Just throwing that out there. 

17 (Pause.) 

18 Okay. Well, we will be around, so if 

19 others show up or if someone that does -- does 

20 decide they want to speak, we -- we can resume, 

21 but for the sake of our court reporter, we'll 

22 take a -- take a little recess and give you a 
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1 break until we actually have something for you to 

2 write again. 

3 (Brief recess.) 

4 (Discussion off the record.) 

5 MR. CULLIGAN: We were just going to wait 

6 till you were both in the room and then get 

7 started again. Are you ready? So we've got two 

8 more speakers. We've got Stephanie Herron and 

9 David Hull. So if you two want to come up? You 

10 can both come up and -- so you guys weren't here 

11 for the speech on how to -- how to do this. 

12 MS. HERRON: I'm here. 

13 MR. CULLIGAN: When we call either of you 

14 and if we can start with you, Stephanie, you'll 

15 spell your name for the court reporter. Dan will 

16 click the start. You'll see green lights. 

17 They'll stay green for four minutes. Then 

18 they'll turn yellow. That'll let you know you 

19 have one minute left, and then they'll turn red, 

20 and you know, you should be pretty much wrapping 

21 up then. We're probably not going to, you know, 

22 buzz you and kick you out right as it turns red, 
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1 but definitely be -- be just about done at that 

2 point. 

3 So with that, if you are ready, I will 

4 have you go first. Very good. 

5 MS. HERRON: Okay. My name is Stephanie 

6 Herron, S-T-E-P-H-A-N-I-E, H-E-R-R-O-N, like the 

7 bird with an extra R. I -- do I need to say my 

8 address? 

9 MR. CULLIGAN: No, just your name. 

10 MS. HERRON: I am from Wilmington, 

11 Delaware. Thank you for the opportunity to 

12 comment. I appreciate it. David and I came all 

13 the way down because we felt this was a very 

14 important event. 

15 So obviously we're here today to comment 

16 on the Federal Implementation Plan for the Clean 

17 Power Plan. And I'm from Delaware, and I expect 

18 and hope, but strongly expect, that my state will 

19 submit a state implementation plan so that, 

20 hopefully, they won't need the Federal 

21 Implementation Plan, but there are a few things 

22 that I think are very important about it. 
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1 I think that the Federal Implementation 

2 Plan should be relatively equal. I think that if 

3 you're going to change the mass-based or rate4 based, it would make sense for you to apply that 

5 evenly. Just choose one or the other for every 

6 state that gets the Federal Implementation Plan. 

7 I think that it's very important to limit 

8 the role of trading between the states because I 

9 don't really think that it's fair to sort of push 

10 off pollution from, say, a state like Delaware 

11 onto a state like West Virginia or another state 

12 that has a lot more power plants. I don't really 

13 think that that's just in a big picture way. And 

14 I think that it's one of the most important 

15 things about the plans -- state plans and the 

16 federal plans are that the benefits of them -- 

17 well, the benefits -- the health benefits and the 

18 financial benefits that come from the Clean Power 

19 Plan should be prioritizing the communities that 

20 live close to power plants and communities that 

21 are most disadvantaged by living close to power 

22 plants from a health perspective, from an 
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1 economic perspective, and really, across the 

2 board we see that low income communities and 

3 communities of color, in particular, live near 

4 polluting land uses like power plants, and -- so 

5 in -- in addition to being disproportionately 

6 impacted by the negatives, we should really try 

7 to prioritize those communities with some of the 

8 positive impacts of the plan, investing heavily 

9 in energy efficiency for low income communities 

10 and communities near power plants and making sure 

11 that we're directly putting renewable energy in 

12 the reach of communities that live near fossil 

13 fueled power plants is key, in my opinion. 

14 I think that we also need to -- I totally 

15 lost my train of thought. I guess that would 

16 have been good if I wrote it down, but I think 

17 that we also need to make sure that there is a 

18 strong environmental justice analysis in every 

19 state and that we make sure that we're not 

20 increasing pollution in any communities where our 

21 overall intention is obviously to decrease 

22 pollution but to make sure that we're decreasing 
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1 pollution across the board and that we're 

2 decreasing pollution the most in the communities 

3 that have the most pollution and that we consider 

4 the cumulative impacts of not only power plants 

5 but power plants in other polluting land uses 

6 that cause health impacts and, you know, just in 

7 general environmental impacts. So I think that 

8 considering the cumulative impacts of communities 

9 that have multiple power plants or power plants 

10 and other polluting or dangerous land uses is 

11 critical. And I hope that the EPA will -- when 

12 writing the Federal Implementation Plans really 

13 keep an -- a close eye on fairness and justice 

14 from the small, small picture point of view that 

15 the people who live in those communities should 

16 benefit the -- should be prioritized and benefit 

17 first but also from a bigger picture point of 

18 view because I am from a state that I know will 

19 submit a state implementation plan. 

20 I'm from a state where we haven't done 

21 nearly enough to address climate change. 

22 Obviously I don't think that any state really 
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1 has, but we've tried very hard. We are one of 

2 the founding members of the original Greenhouse 

3 Gas Initiative. We have a renewable portfolio 

4 stating there's an energy efficiency resource 

5 standard and we're really trying to do our part 

6 in Delaware, but we are one of the most 

7 vulnerable states to sea level rise. We have the 

8 lowest average elevation of any state. 

9 And the city I live in -- in Wilmington 

10 -- communities are already feeling the impacts of 

11 flooding during regular storm -- regular rain 

12 events and especially big storms. Sea level rise 

13 is already impacting my state, and we're trying 

14 to do our part, but we are a small state and we 

15 need other states to chip in and do their part. 

16 And so I hope that the Federal Implementation 

17 Plan will be stringent and strong, and keep an 

18 eye on justice, that it's not only impacting the 

19 people who live in that state. Thank you. 

20 MR. CULLIGAN: Thank you. Ready, David. 

21 MR. HULL: My name is David Hull, 

22 H-U-double L. 
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1 I live in Wilmington, Delaware. I'm a 

2 member of the Sierra Club. I've been living in 

3 Wilmington for almost 20 years. And I have seen 

4 the changes in the state due to things like 

5 climate rise -- climate change and sea level 

6 rise, the beach erosion that's taken place, 

7 people losing their homes, the havoc that's been 

8 played on the shore birds and the animals that 

9 are there, things like the horseshoe crabs and 

10 the red plovers that come down and depend on 

11 them. Their habitat is affected. 

12 And like Stephanie said, our state is a 

13 very small state, and we're down wind and down 

14 river from everybody. We feel like we're 

15 buffeted by the larger states around us. I live 

16 right on the Brandywine River, and any time there 

17 is a flood -- a heavy rainstorm up in 

18 Pennsylvania, we get tremendous amounts of water 

19 rushing down -- and debris. And you can see it 

20 in the city of Wilmington. There is just a lot 

21 of flooding of houses. People have had to be 

22 bought out of entire neighborhoods from the 
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1 flooding that's been caused there. And I feel 

2 like there -- because it's such a small state, we 

3 -- we don't really get -- we don't really swing a 

4 very big hammer, and we're really at the mercy of 

5 the larger states around us with more power 

6 plants, and especially the states that might not 

7 be going as far as they should in terms of the -- 

8 of the energy plan, the Clean Power Plan that -- 

9 that we're talking about today. 

10 I'm not from Delaware originally. My 

11 family lives down in North Carolina. And North 

12 Carolina -- I have a feeling -- is one of those 

13 states that's going to dig in its heels and drag 

14 their feet and not submit a power plan. So, 

15 we're going to be at the mercy of people like 

16 that. 

17 My daughter lives there. My -- her 

18 husband, and my grandson, Desmond, who turned two 

19 in August, lives down there. And I really hope 

20 and encourage you guys to make sure that my 

21 grandson has a future where he doesn't have to 

22 wear one of those masks like they do in China to 
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1 be able to go outside and breathe or to be able 

2 to step outside and see stars, things like that, 

3 not to have to go to a planetarium to just be 

4 able see them like I used to do, to be able to go 

5 to the beach -- the same beaches that I went to. 

6 And none of that's going to happen unless 

7 we protect it now. That's really what I have to 

8 say. And I thank you-all for giving me the 

9 opportunity. 

10 MR. CULLIGAN: Thank you both for 

11 commenting and also taking the time to come all 

12 the way from Delaware. 

13 I -- hopefully, neither of the lawyers at 

14 the table are going to object to my saying 

15 this -- 

16 MR. CULLIGAN: I had a question. 

17 MR. HULL: Oh. 

18 MR. CULLIGAN: I have a question for you. 

19 I'm familiar a little bit with the horseshoe 

20 crabs coming to the shore in Delaware. I wonder 

21 if you -- do you have any specific information 

22 about how climate change is affecting them? It's 
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1 -- it's a remarkable phenomenon that the 

2 horseshoe crabs -- 

3 MR. HULL: Yes, I don't -- I don't have 

4 anything on me, no, but I know that their habitat 

5 has been affected and there -- you know, there's 

6 a ripple effect that the red plovers that come 

7 down from Canada depend on the horseshoe crab 

8 eggs because they fly from Canada down to -- I 

9 think the tip of South America. And this is one 

10 of their major stopovers. They feast on these 

11 eggs. 

12 MS. HERRON: The Red Knots. 

13 MR. HULL: The Red Knot? 

14 MS. HERRON: Red Knot, yes. 

15 MR. HULL: Red Knot. I'm sorry. I got 

16 the wrong name. The Red Knot birds. That's -- 

17 that's their -- their major fueling stop on their 

18 what -- 6,000 mile journey. 

19 MS. HERRON: So, I -- I think -- I don't 

20 know. I'm not a scientist either, but I've read 

21 a couple articles about this. 

22 I think that the thing that's changed is 
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1 that the --obviously birds are triggered by 

2 seasonal -- you know, seasonal things that make 

3 them think, oh, time to, like, fly south, right? 

4 Or fly north. And that the problem is that the 

5 horseshoe crabs are very consistent. Obviously 

6 they've been around since dinosaurs. And they 

7 are having some trouble with their numbers but 

8 mostly it's just a timing thing. 

9 When the horseshoe crabs lay their eggs 

10 is not necessarily when all the birds are coming. 

11 MR. CULLIGAN: I see. 

12 MS. HERRON: I believe. You could -- 

13 there's lots of articles about it. 

14 MR. CULLIGAN: Thanks. 

15 MS. HERRON: I think. I think that's it. 

16 MR. CULLIGAN: So this point is probably 

17 you're all probably aware of this, but -- and I 

18 know several of you are coming from different 

19 states. You mentioned in particular thinking 

20 about Delaware's plan. Any state that is 

21 actively doing the plan, it's probably doing some 

22 sort of informal public process at this point. 
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1 And at some point in the process would be doing a 

2 formal process like this. So there's -- you 

3 know, there's also an opportunity to comment 

4 through that process which I suspect most of you 

5 would be already on top of, but just to note it. 

6 MS. HERRON: Thank you. 

7 MR. HULL: Thank you very much for the 

8 opportunity. 

9 MR. CULLIGAN: All right. And we've got 

10 one more speaker at this point. Elena Woods. 

11 MS. WOODS: So I'll just be reading from 

12 this. 

13 MR. CULLIGAN: All right. So, I don't 

14 know if you heard, but even though it's pretty 

15 straightforward, spell your name -- 

16 MS. WOODS: Okay. 

17 MR. CULLIGAN: -- for this and then the 

18 light will turn yellow when you've got one minute 

19 left. 

20 MS. WOODS: All right. My name is Elena 

21 Woods, E-L-E-N-A, Woods, W-O-O-D-S. And I 

22 appreciate the opportunity to speak today. 
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1 In Louisiana coastal erosion is a major 

2 problem. We are known for being shaped like a 

3 boot, but the state is no longer shaped like a 

4 boot. 

5 Louisiana is the country's second biggest 

6 crude oil producer and refiner. It is also the 

7 largest port for the entry of crude oil into the 

8 U.S. Oil and gas removal is speeding up already 

9 rapid erosion. There is no doubt that industry 

10 has contributed to the destruction of Louisiana's 

11 ecologically diverse wetlands. 

12 Louisiana is home to about 45 percent of 

13 the south's wetlands. In addition to being home 

14 to an amazing array of wildlife and an important 

15 environment for carbon storage and water 

16 filtration, Louisiana is a wetland to provide a 

17 barrier that normally act as the mainline of 

18 defense against flooding. As that barrier is 

19 destroyed, cities like New Orleans and Lafayette 

20 that lie just beyond it will experience even more 

21 severe flooding. 

22 Living in Louisiana you become very aware 
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1 of the impact water has on daily life. My house 

2 has been flooded twice. Several of my friends' 

3 homes were completely destroyed by Katrina, and 

4 I'm not from New Orleans. My area has 

5 experienced record flooding, the likes of which 

6 has not been seen in the past 75 years. 

7 This past summer the Red River, which 

8 cuts my hometown in half, crested at over 30 feet 

9 above its banks. Working for the Red Cross Flood 

10 Relief, I encountered hundreds of people impacted 

11 by the flooding. Many of them no longer had a 

12 house to go home to. Those that still had a 

13 home, had no electricity and no air conditioning 

14 in the stifling 100-degree southern heat. 

15 One man had an alligator at his back 

16 door. When the river rises, they have -- they 

17 have to go somewhere else, too. 

18 Louisiana is just one of many parts of 

19 the U.S. where we are feeling the effects of 

20 climate change. And coastal erosion is just one 

21 of our problems. 

22 Industrial facilities contribute a huge 
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1 amount of pollution to our water systems. 

2 According to a report from the Environmental 

3 America Research and Policy Center in 2012, 

4 industrial facilities release more than 12.6 

5 million pounds of toxic chemicals into rivers, 

6 bayous, and other water systems in Louisiana 

7 alone. 

8 More than 44,000 pounds of chemicals 

9 linked to cancer are released into our water 

10 table. That put us at third place in terms of 

11 polluted water in the nation. 

12 In addition to poisoning our water 

13 supply, air pollution contributes to asthma and 

14 prolonged allergy seasons as well as fueling a 

15 system that produces harsher storms and rising 

16 sea levels. 

17 In 2011 power plants in Louisiana 

18 released 140 million metric tons of carbon 

19 pollution into the air. We know that this kind 

20 of pollution contributes heavily to the 

21 development of asthma. As someone who has 

22 developed asthma while living in Louisiana, I 
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1 understand that it is an expensive and 

2 restrictive disease. My family has spent 

3 thousands of dollars on medical expenses related 

4 to asthma. This is just one of the many reasons 

5 I believe that the Clean Power Plan is so 

6 important. It is predicted that it will prevent 

7 150,000 asthma attacks and 6,600 deaths annually 

8 -- premature deaths annually. 

9 I hope that we can take concrete steps to 

10 clean up our air and stem the massive amounts of 

11 carbon pollution in our country. Investing in 

12 clean energy will create jobs in Louisiana and 

13 elsewhere. There is no leeway on this issue. We 

14 need to act now to save these areas, save our 

15 cities. Thank you. 

16 MR. CULLIGAN: Thank you. And did you 

17 come all the way up here just to testify? 

18 MS. WOODS: No, I go to American. 

19 MR. CULLIGAN: I was going to say that 

20 was going to be quite impressive. 

21 MS. WOODS: Okay. Thank you. 

22 MR. FISHER: Are you guys taking walk-
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1 ins? 

2 MR. CULLIGAN: Yes. You do need to go to 

3 that front table and give them your name. We 

4 keep sort of an official list there, but then 

5 they will come up with a card with your name for 

6 us, and you can talk. So, yes. 

7 (Pause.) 

8 MR. CULLIGAN: All right. So, John, if 

9 you want to come on up? And I think you were 

10 here enough to see the rules, or do you want us 

11 to run through the -- 

12 MR. FISHER: I'm sorry? 

13 MR. CULLIGAN: When you start speaking, 

14 spell your name, and this will be green for four 

15 minutes, and then it will turn yellow, give you 

16 one more minute, and -- 

17 MR. FISHER: Sure. No problem. 

18 Yes, I probably -- I -- 

19 MR. CULLIGAN: The hearing's about to 

20 begin. If folks could please take their seats, 

21 he hearing's about to begin or continue. 

22 MR. FISHER: Sorry, I think I probably 
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1 won't take the full five minutes. Right. 

2 My name is John Fisher, and that's 

3 J-O-H-N, F-I-S-H-E-R. 

4 Brief introduction on myself. I'm 

5 originally from Pennsylvania. I live in D.C. 

6 now, near the NoMa-Gaulladet Station. 

7 And so, my background is that, first, I 

8 am a runner. I'm a runner, and I enjoy breathing 

9 in the clean air around the city. I do live in 

10 D.C. because I think it's a very environmentally 

11 friendly place, and I like the fresh air. 

12 I see pictures online a lot of cities 

13 from large industrial countries with smog totally 

14 covering their cities, and the skyline for those 

15 cities is just unbearable. Residents have their 

16 faces covered in masks, right, so that they can 

17 breathe. 

18 As a person that's active outside, I 

19 don't ever want to be in that situation, and I'd 

20 like to see policies put in place to avoid that 

21 from happening -- prevent that from happening, so 

22 -- but I'm -- in addition to being a runner, I'm 
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1 also a web developer. 

2 And this is important and related for 

3 this hearing because I know as well as anybody 

4 else that information is spreading very quickly, 

5 and it's becoming ever more present. And what 

6 this means is that people are going to become 

7 aware of the policies that are in place, and the 

8 organizations that have put them there, and what 

9 is or is not being done to prevent health risks, 

10 which many people have mentioned before, from 

11 coming into play. And so, with this ever 

12 increasing amount of information, it's good to 

13 stay on top of policy and put in place whatever 

14 we can to prevent these health issues from 

15 happening. 

16 So, those are the majority of my 

17 comments, but just to prove the point or to give 

18 a good example, just while I was sitting here, I 

19 looked up some statistics online. I went to my 

20 trusty Wikipedia and looked at the CO2 article, 

21 and it said carbon emissions in 2013 the U.S. 

22 burned 10 gigatons, and that's second behind 
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1 China which is one of the, you know, countries I 

2 was alluding to with the masks over their face 

3 for the residents, many of them. Next behind the 

4 United States was the European Union. Right, but 

5 the European Union is not just one country. It's 

6 28. And we have more than those combined 28 -- 

7 more CO2 emissions than those combined 28. Next 

8 behind the European Union was India. 

9 So, we are well ahead of the game in 

10 terms of CO2 production, and I think information 

11 like this is becoming ever more present, and we 

12 need to stay on top of that. 

13 MR. CULLIGAN: Thank you. 

14 MR. FISHER: Yes. 

15 MR. CULLIGAN: All right. So it looks 

16 like we'll take another -- take another break. 

17 (Brief recess.) 

18 MR. CULLIGAN: So, you are Collin Rees? 

19 MR. REES: I am, right. 

20 MR. CULLIGAN: So, the way this will work 

21 is Dan will hit the button. You should spell 

22 your name for the court reporter. You'll see 
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1 green lights. They'll be green for four minutes. 

2 At the end of four minutes they'll turn yellow. 

3 That will let you know you have one minute left, 

4 and then they'll turn red at five minutes. And, 

5 you know, it should be a, nominal -- like, 

6 definitely be wrapping up at five minutes, but 

7 we're not going to kick you out here. There's 

8 not a huge line but -- but, you know, be at the 

9 end of your thought. So with that, Collin, we'll 

10 turn it over to you. 

11 MR. REES: Great. My name is Collin 

12 Rees, C-O-L-L-I-N, R-E-E-S. 

13 Good evening. My name is Collin Rees, 

14 and I live in Washington, D.C. Thank you for the 

15 opportunity to testify on the EPA's Clean Power 

16 Plan and Federal Implementation Plans. 

17 As a trained engineer and scientist, I've 

18 worked by whole life to use science for the 

19 advancement of the public good. And as a 

20 professional campaigner and advocate for a better 

21 world, I've continued that mission by working to 

22 combat the injustices of dirty air, dirty water, 
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1 and the devastating impacts of climate change. 

2 After graduating from university, I lived 

3 in Kenya for a full year working in the rural 

4 savannah along with an Masai tribe. What I saw 

5 was a part of the world struggling with the 

6 brutal impacts of climate devastation. A deadly 

7 drought had stricken the region, killing cattle 

8 everywhere and eliminating centuries old water 

9 sources. People were dying as a result of the 

10 carbon debt built up by developed nations over 

11 the past two centuries. 

12 The resulting cycles of drought, hunger, 

13 poverty, and lack of development that I witnessed 

14 were directly tied to the fossil fuels Americans 

15 and Europeans have burned without limitation for 

16 decades upon decades. 

17 The happiest that I saw the villagers in 

18 my entire year with the tribe was the day that 

19 the town store installed the solar panel on the 

20 roof. 

21 I worked with the Masai for 12 months and 

22 made some of the closest friends in my life. 
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1 Then I came back to the United States, resolved 

2 to do what I could to alter this damaging 

3 situation, already a reality for so many around 

4 the world from getting even worse. 

5 In my work I collaborate closely with 

6 Neeka [phonetic], a Bangladeshi woman whose home 

7 has already been swept away by rising sea levels. 

8 She moved her family to an already over-crowded 

9 city where they live 14 people to a room in a 

10 rickety shack. 

11 I work with Rickyma [phonetic], an 

12 Indonesian rice farmer who lives in the shadow of 

13 an American-financed coal plant and can hardly 

14 breathe some days, let alone battling her way 

15 through the smog outside to go into the fields. 

16 And I work with Andrew who has been 

17 fighting a coal plant in Peoria, Illinois, for 

18 the last four years because he has already seen 

19 the damage that it is causing to his daughter's 

20 health. 

21 Under the Clean Power Plan each state can 

22 develop its own plan to reduce deadly carbon 
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1 emissions, taking into account its own 

2 circumstances; but for those states that refuse 

3 to do so, it is even more important to protect 

4 their citizens with a strong, just, and well5 designed Federal Implementation Plan. 

6 This model Federal Plan should ensure 

7 that carbon pollution standards achieve the 

8 pollution reductions promised in the Final Clean 

9 Power Plan and strive to exceed them, ensure that 

10 states address carbon pollution from new power 

11 plants to achieve overall electric sector 

12 reductions in carbon pollution, protect low 

13 income consumers by maximizing utilities' 

14 incentives to invest in energy efficiency which 

15 lowers energy bills, ensure the plan protects and 

16 benefits minority, low income, and indigenous 

17 communities that have long borne the brunt of 

18 fossil fuel pollution and may be most likely to 

19 experience the ravages of climate change, 

20 restrict give aways and allowances to the fossil 

21 fuel industry and the most polluting sources, and 

22 minimize switching of coal to natural gas. It's 
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1 like coal plans that would log us into 40 more 

2 years of fossil fuel production while 

3 incentivizing strong renewable production. 

4 Thank you for the opportunity to testify 

5 this evening. 

6 MR. CULLIGAN: Thank you. 

7 And we are just about done. 

8 Thank you both. 

9 MR. REES: It was a pleasure. 

10 (Discussion off the record.) 

11 MR. CULLIGAN: Concludes today's -- the 

12 hearing. Thank you very much. 

13 (The hearing was adjourned at 8:00 

14 o'clock p.m.) 

15 

16 

17 

18 

19 

20 

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22